Wire In A Fire
by Maat
Summary: Once upon a time, the world ended. Now all that's left is to survive, cling to the ones you love...and fight to the last man. Companion piece to 'Of The World,' set in the alternate universe of "The End." Cas/OC
1. It Starts With An Earthquake

**Title: **Wire In A Fire  
**Author: **Maat**  
Characters: **Dean, Sam, Lucifer, Bobby, Chuck, Jo, Castiel, Eli (OC)**  
Pairings:** Cas/OC**  
Rating:** M, for language, violence, sex, drugs, misery, Satan, zombies, Sarah Palin bashing, and the end of the world**  
Spoilers:** Canon: Thru the end of season 5. Fandom: **This is part of my **_**It's The End **_**'verse. **After chapter one, there are **extreme spoilers for **_**Of The World, **_**so if you don't want to be spoiled, go to my profile and read that first**_**.**_

**Summary:** Once upon a time, everything good in the world fell apart. In the fight for survival, everyone changes, everyone is betrayed, and in the end, everyone loses. Companion piece to _Of The World_, set in the alternate universe of "The End." An attempt to answer questions: How did the characters fall so far? Why did Sam say yes to Lucifer? How did Castiel break his foot? Why were there two bullet holes in Bobby's chair? And what the hell happened to Eli?

**Author's Note: **The title _Wire In A Fire_, and the chapter titles, come from the song "It's The End Of The World As We Know It" by R.E.M., as do all the other story titles in this 'verse. It's a running theme that I don't want to break. **BUT** the quotes at the top of each chapter are from "How Far We've Come" by Matchbox 20. If you haven't heard it, or even if you have, **I highly recommend listening to it**. It fits this story so perfectly it's almost eerie. Therefore: The titles may come from one song, but **the quotes of "How Far We've Come" are the theme of the story.**

Please remember to review! Writing the zombie apocalypse takes a lot out of a girl.

* * *

**Chapter 1:**** It Starts With An Earthquake**

_Waking up at the start of the end of the world,  
But it's feeling just like every other morning before,  
Now I wonder what my life is going to mean if it's gone_

_

* * *

_

Eli should have known they were fucked when the demon Crowley was killed.

The attempt at Carthage had been a disaster. Ellen died protecting her daughter, and Dean had been discovered before he could get within shooting distance of the devil. It was only with some quick action by Castiel that they had escaped at all, and now the Colt was with Lucifer, and the demon who had supplied them with it was dead.

Dean still refused to call Sam. He insisted that things would not have gone any differently with him there. "The only thing that would have happened is that Lucifer would have his vessel right now," Dean said gruffly, shooting whiskey like it was water as Jo sobbed quietly on the couch in the next room. "Trust me, we're better off without him here. He would have walked right into Lucifer's hands."

Dean may not have been speaking to his brother, but Eli was. They spoke nearly every night, quietly in the dark outside of Bobby's house where no one could hear them.

_"Ellen is dead?" _his voice said, cracking a little. Eli nodded into the phone.

"Yeah. A hell hound ripped into her. Jo's pretty broken up about it…obviously." She paused. "Things are shit, Sam. We need you here. Dean too, though he doesn't realize it yet. Please come back."

_"You know what Dean said."_

"Yeah, well Dean is not the boss of us!" she snapped. "This feels wrong, Sam, really wrong."

_"I know. But I can't, Eli, not if Dean won't have me. Give him time. Maybe he'll come around. He's still refusing to speak to me?"_

"Or about you, or anything having to do with your existence or location." Eli sighed, starting to pace, her footsteps stirring the dusty ground at her feet. "I don't know if he's gonna come around, Sam."

_"He will. We're brothers."_

"I hope to God you're right."

* * *

The months rolled on. Jo traveled occasionally with Dean, Eli, and Castiel, but there was something shadowed and broken in her eyes, and more often than not she stayed with Bobby. The four of them were able, barely, to wrest away Famine's ring, but Pestilence was too quick, vanishing into the night with his power and his secrets.

It was right around the time of the presidential elections that he struck, but not in America. The Croatoan virus was pumped first into Great Britain, causing a panic that eventually sealed off the island to outsiders. The same happened to Australia, New Zealand, the Philippines, Japan. People started calling it "The Island Virus."

"Listen to that shit," Bobby said grumpily one night as they kicked back at his house, drinking whiskey and staring moodily at the TV. "_The Island Virus_, can you believe that crap? Like it can't spread around. All it is is Pestilence winding us up, getting us to turn on each other, knock us down one by one. It'll hit us soon, mark my words."

"He's having fun with it," Eli said softly, watching Sarah Palin give a rousing speech about the need to secure their borders against any and all immigrants. She was even hinting that the best thing to do would be to kick existing immigrants out of the country, so as not to take supplies away from 'good, hardworking Americans.' "He's laughing at us."

"Thing to do now is start hoarding supplies," Dean said, pouring himself another shot with unsteady hands. His voice was gruff but surprisingly clear. "Load up on anything we can't live without."

"Unfortunately I think that the rest of America has the same idea," Castiel pointed out wearily. "Raids have begun on the grocery stores. People are panicking." He was sitting next to Eli on the couch, one arm wrapped loosely around her shoulders. Her legs were propped up on the table, and Jo's head was in her lap. The younger blonde's eyes were closed, apparently sleeping, as Eli idly stroked her hair.

"Yeah, panicking so much they're gonna elect a psycho for president," Dean said, jerking his head roughly to the television screen. "Listen to her. Instead of keeping the peace she's stoking the fire." He shook his head. "Pushing for a US-Canada border wall. It's ridiculous."

"And the homicide rate of immigrants is up crazy high," Eli said, moving her hand from Jo's hair to accept a shot glass from Dean. "Her hate-talk is causing riots and lynchings."

"Just wait," Jo said quietly, startling them all as she opened her eyes to reveal that she had been awake the whole time. Her voice sounded strange, almost dead. "It's going to get much, much worse."

* * *

It was worse than any of them could ever have imagined.

America was struck last. Russia, Europe, and most of Asia were crawling with Croats when Palin swore in as President, and the first cases started popping up in US cities only weeks later. Whole states became hot zones, sealed off: New Jersey, D.C., most of Florida, New York, and Arizona. The right to group assembly was repealed, as was the right to free movement. Border crossings sprung up on state lines and city limits. Anyone even suspected of being infected was shot. Every citizen was armed; rioting, burning, and looting became the only way to survive as the entire system of commerce slowly shut down. Martial law was enacted, with Palin as a figurehead, her face plastered over any surface that was left standing and not marred by the continuous _Croatoan_ graffiti.

As all of this was happening, earthquakes rocked the major fault-lines, causing tsunamis and leveling cities. Most of California sank into the ocean. The weather systems became vicious; one storm alone knocked Chicago off the map. Suicides jumped to an all-time high as humanity decided they just couldn't take it anymore.

Bobby's house had become a fortress. They set up a fence around the perimeter with barbed wire. Eli and Castiel used whatever power they could to protect them: hiding sigils, binding traps, spells to alert them to intruders. They stockpiled gunpowder, guns, knives, canned food, water, toilet paper, blankets, matches, anything they could think of to stay alive. It was no use fighting the Croats; they were everywhere. The best thing to do was wait, shoot whatever came near them, and save as many innocents as they could.

_"You guys are taking in refugees now?"_ Sam's voice asked incredulously over the phone one night.

Eli plugged one ear to keep out the sound of a wailing baby and pressed the other closer to her head. "Well, what do you expect us to do, turn them out for the Croats to get?" she snapped. "They're coming in droves now; word of our little sanctuary has spread, as has the knowledge that we have a man who can heal minor injuries by laying his hands on them. It's a madhouse. Where are you?"

_"And what about finding the Colt?"_ Sam asked, ignoring her question. She sighed, moving away from the people huddled in the yard full of cars and into the moonlit night.

"We've been trying." She paused. "A little too hard."

_"What's that supposed to mean?"_

"We caught wind of a demon who used to run with Lilith a few towns over," she said wearily, sitting down in the dirt and holding her head in her hand. "Caught him in a devil's trap. Dean…got the information out of him. Or tried. He knew very little."

_"Torture?_" Sam asked softly. _"Shit, Eli._"

"We need you, Sam," she said, starting to tear up. "It's…it's hell here. Please come back. Help us."

_"It's too late, Eli, you know it is,_" he said in a grim voice. She shook her head fiercely, despite the fact that he couldn't see her.

"It's never too late."

There was a long pause on the other end of the line. Finally he said, in a very small voice: _"Maybe I can stop this."_

Eli sat up a little straighter. "What the hell are you talking about, Sam?"

_"I…I know this is gonna sound crazy, but I had a meeting. With Death."_

"Death the Horseman? With a capital D?" she breathed incredulously. "Shut up."

_"Yeah. He, uh, he did me a favor. Lucifer has him tethered, but he was able to, uh, _borrow_ the ring from Pestilence, and he gave me his. He said that with all four I might be able to put Lucifer back in the pit."_

"What?" she asked, standing unsteadily and brushing dirt from her jeans. "What the hell are you talking about?"

_"Bring me the last two rings and I'll tell you everything."_

"Where are you?" she demanded. He sighed over the line.

_"Detroit. 466 Maple street, apartment 3B. Have Cas zap you over here with the rings."_ When she hesitated, he implored: _"Please, Eli. This is our last shot."_

She nodded. "Fine. Be there in ten."

_"Thanks."_

"Don't thank me yet," she muttered darkly, hanging up, then headed into the house to find Castiel.

He was upstairs, looking at himself critically in the mirror. When she entered he turned to face her, his normally stoic face wrinkled in confusion. "Dean gave me these to wear," he said, tugging self-consciously at his army-fatigue cargo pants and loose-fitting shirt. "I don't understand what was wrong with my usual clothing. I understand that occasionally trench coats are not optimal for hand-to-hand combat, but…" He trailed off, noticing the wild look in Eli's eyes. "What is it?"

"Put on your shoes," she said, indicating the pair of combat boots sitting unlaced by the bed. "We're going on a trip."

* * *

The first thing Eli did the moment they appeared in the room was pull Sam into a hug so tight it was like a death grip.

"Eli," he croaked, patting her back awkwardly. "Air, please…"

"I'm just so happy to see your stupid face, you giant freak," she muttered into his shirt before finally pulling away.

"Good to see you too, Eli," he said wearily, rubbing his ribs. He glanced to the other side of the room. "Cas. Thanks for coming. Nice look, by the way."

"It is … good to see you, Sam," Castiel said delicately, standing a few yards away and fixing Sam with his usual scrutinizing look. "You know that I have never agreed with Dean's banishment of you."

"Yeah, I know, it's okay," Sam said, running an anxious hand through his hair. He glanced around the room almost nervously, and Eli followed his eyes, noting for the first time how dilapidated it was, boarded-up windows and cracks in the walls, the bed nothing more than an ancient cot. Sam himself looked like he hadn't showered in weeks, and smelled the same; his clothing was ripped, his hair a little too long, his face thin and shadowed by the first traces of a beard. He turned back to Eli. "Do you have them?"

She pulled two rings from her pocket. "When he notices they're gone, there will be hell to pay," she warned, tipping them into his hand. He stared at them for a long moment, his face pensive.

"Hopefully by then all of this will be over." He reached into his pocket for the last two rings. When they were all together in his hand they fused, like attached by magnets. Eli raised her eyebrows.

"So…what's the plan?"

"These rings will open the door to Lucifer's cage," Sam said quietly, clenching his hand around them. Eli noticed that his whole body was shaking, like he was strung out. "All we need to do is get him back in."

"Great idea," Eli said sarcastically. Castiel just hovered in the background, listening, his gaze carefully blank. "And how exactly do you plan on doing that?"

Sam looked up at her, his jaw clenched. "I'm going to say yes to Lucifer."

There was a long pause. Then Eli crossed her arms and said, with an exasperated sigh: "Your sense of humor really blows, Sam."

"I'm not joking," he said. "Death told me what to do. If I say yes to Lucifer and can maintain control of my body for just a few seconds, I can throw us both in that hole. It's the only way."

"You stupid son of a…" she started, surging forward, but Castiel caught her arm.

"He has a point, Eli," he rasped, and she swung on him.

"Don't tell me you're actually _agreeing _to this stupid plan!"

"What other choice do we have?" he asked hotly, breaking his calm façade. "In case you haven't noticed, the world has already gone to hell. I've heard the whispers, I know you have too: even the angels are thinking of giving up. Dean won't say yes. We have no plan. This could be…"

"He could destroy the world," Eli snapped. Castiel put a hand on her shoulder and stared into her eyes, his gaze somber.

"Look around you, Eli," he said quietly. "The world is already destroyed. Let Sam do this."

"I can do it," Sam said with false confidence, and they turned back to him. He looked so weak standing there, so thin and frail and haunted and lost. Eli blinked back hot tears and shook her head fiercely, coming up to hug him once more, her face buried in his dirty shirt.

"No, you can't. But what other choice have we got?" She pulled away and cupped his face in her hand, then on impulse stretched on her toes and briefly kissed his lips. "Fight him, Sam. Don't let this all be a mistake."

"I promise," he said, hands on her shoulders. "I won't give up."

He lied.


	2. Eye Of A Hurricane

**Important AN**: Since Sam wasn't with them and history went differently, the episode "Changing Channels" and it's ensuing revelations about Eli (in this 'verse) never happened. So they never found out anything about her power other than who her father is and that she can exorcise demons. Just keep that in mind.

And now, the long-awaited chapter two!

* * *

**Chapter 2: Eye Of A Hurricane**

_The cars are moving like a half a mile an hour  
And I started staring at the passengers who're waving goodbye  
Can you tell me what was ever really special about me all this time?_

_

* * *

_

Eli should have known they were really, _really_ fucked when the angels left.

By now, a solid two years had passed since the beginning of the nightmare. Lucifer had his true vessel, and was wearing him like a well-made suit, causing death and destruction wherever he set foot. Sam was… gone. Eli didn't know if he was still in there somewhere, screaming, or if he had joined Lucifer in the end, or if he had been wiped away like a stain, leaving only the devil in that body. Whatever, wherever he was, it didn't matter now.

Once Lucifer had his vessel the angels upped their last, desperate attempts to get Dean to say yes. They threatened, cajoled, and pleaded. They staked out Bobby's house, which was quickly being overrun by refugees anyway, prompting the whole group (except Bobby, who stayed behind to 'hold down the fort') to pick up camp and move in the night to an abandoned military base about thirty miles away. They called this place "Camp Lakawana"; later, it would only be known as "Camp 1."

Still, Dean refused to give up. He was certain, so certain, that finding the Colt was the answer to their problems. That if he could just get one more shot at killing the devil he could save them all and stop the madness. It became an obsession for him, the only thing in his universe that mattered anymore. The rest of them – Castiel, Eli, Bobby, Chuck, Jo – were just peripheral, soldiers, workers, sometimes pests. Not even really friends. Not anymore. Not since Sam.

Then one day, the angels were gone.

They had been whispering about it for a while now; all of the battle-wearied survivors knew that it was a possibility, that if Dean kept saying no they would eventually be abandoned to rot on the devastated earth, but when it actually happened it was a shock. Everyone felt it. It was like the little light that was still left in the world drained away in the span of a millisecond, leaving everything just a bit darker, starker, like a hellish parody of life.

She found Castiel sitting on their cot, staring at his hands with a numb look on his face. "You felt it, then," he said, not looking at her.

"Everyone felt it," Eli said, walking over and sitting next to him. Slowly she unlaced her boots, kicking them to the side and wiggling her socked toes in the cool night air. He continued to stare at his hands.

Finally, in a quiet voice, he said: "Look at me."

Eli turned and really looked at him for the first time since she had entered the room, studying his face. He looked…off. There were too many lines around his eyes, and his skin was too thin, like paper. He looked tired, exhausted really, and his hair curled slightly-greasy around his ears. In other words, exactly how the rest of them looked. Like a human.

"What…" she started, bringing up her hand to trace the curve of his face. "The angels leaving did this?"

Castiel nodded. "It's gone," he murmured. "Most of it. The moment they left it was like watching water slip through my fingers. I tried to hold on, but…" He trailed off, choking on his words. Eli leaned in and wrapped her arms around him.

"Hey, hey there, it's okay," she whispered soothingly. He shook his head.

"My whole body hurts. I have… bruises. And I'm tired. So…" He coughed, sounding like he was going to cry. "So very tired."

"Welcome to our world," Eli said, kissing his neck. "It sucks."

"What am I supposed to _do?_" he asked brokenly. Eli stroked his hair.

"Well, right now I would say get some sleep. It's past midnight anyway. Come on." She tugged him onto the bed until the former angel was curled up in her arms like a child, his head tucked under her chin, his trembling hands around her waist.

"And then what?" he asked into her shoulder, breathing her in and thanking God that at least he had her. At least one thing in this horrible mistake for a world was still good and right. "What use am I anymore?"

She kissed the top of his head. "Tomorrow we'll go to the shooting range," she said decisively. "You're already a wonderful fighter; we'll make you a fantastic shot." She paused. "We still need you, Cas. You know so much that we don't, have an insight into things that none of us can fathom. Nobody can take that from you."

He was silent for a long time. "We should never have let Sam say yes."

Eli sighed, trying to hold back tears. She stared at the cracked old ceiling, then at the walls, their clothes and guns and few personal items stacked on the floor. The whole room was about the size of a closet, but it was better than most; at least they had their privacy. "I know."

"I love you."

She rested her chin on his head and closed her eyes. "I know. Get some sleep, love. Things will be better in the morning."

He knew it was a lie, but he loved her for it.

Castiel closed his eyes and slept.

* * *

Two weeks later, the broken radio shoved in the corner of the room flickered to life and began blaring a very familiar voice.

"Whatizit?" Eli gasped, jerking out of a deep sleep and instinctively grabbing the gun at the side of the bed. Next to her, Castiel shot up as well, looking disoriented.

"Sam…?" he asked groggily, peering around the darkened space. It was the middle of the night and the moon spooled silver threads through the small windows at the top of the walls, revealing that the room was empty.

Once Eli realized that they weren't under attack she slid out of bed and threw on old jeans and a ragged sweater from a heap on the floor. Gun still in hand, she crossed the room and rummaged through a small pile of derelict items, coming up with the busted radio, its cord trailing pitifully behind it like the tail of an animal. "What the fuck?"

She held it up so Castiel could see, Sam's voice still sputtering out of it. "…understand that it is early, and thank you kindly for waking up to listen to my little announcements. Can everyone hear me? I'm sure you can." There was a pause. "And a special hello to you, Elijah. Enjoying the end of the world?"

Someone pounded on the door and Castiel, having just managed to find pants and lace up his boots but still without a shirt, clutched his gun and opened it warily. Dean burst in, a walkie-talkie in his hand. The walkie was tinnily announcing the same speech as the old radio.

"You hearing this?" he demanded. "It's all over the entire camp. Every fucking radio, TV, phone, anything with a receiver is broadcasting this message."

"It's Lucifer," Castiel said unnecessarily as Eli dropped the radio like it was something disgusting and joined them at the door. "He's tapped into the electronic devices."

"Well that's creepy," Dean snapped. "Come on, we're all gathered in the mess hall. Let's see what the asshole has to say."

They followed Dean down the cramped hallways, Eli barefoot, Castiel struggling in the dark to pull a shirt over his head. Around them blared the message, just a repetition of words to wake everyone up and make them nervous. Castiel's hand found hers in the dark, and she gripped it tightly, noticing with somewhat detached sadness how cold it was, how his human body no longer radiated that otherworldly light and heat she was so used to.

About thirty people were crowded in the mess hall, sitting on chairs and on top of tables, standing huddled in knots, all watching the large broken television in the corner with haunted, weary looks on their faces. Eli caught Jo's eye, sitting next to Chuck, and tried to smile bravely.

Sam's visage was smiling peacefully out of the smashed TV, a large crack running across the screen and dividing his face in two. He looked strange, like he couldn't move his muscles properly, like the face Eli knew so well was just a mask. She felt a surge of hatred rise up inside of her, and she gripped Castiel's hand more tightly, trying to hold back raging emotions.

Finally the message stopped its loop, and Lucifer tilted his head and stared at them. "I hope everyone is bright-eyed and bushy tailed," he said with the hint of a grin. "Because I have a very important announcement to make. At this moment, I am speaking through every receiver in the country. I am speaking to all of you, all of you _survivors_, but I am speaking most especially to Miss Elijah Grant. Hello, Eli."

Everyone turned to stare at her, and she shrank back.

"Did Eli tell you that she's not human?" Lucifer continued blithely, and all heads swiveled back to him. "Not wholly, anyway. She's a Nephilim. Means half-angel." He paused, then smirked. "By the way, hi Castiel." He waved his hand a little. "How does it feel being powerless? Bet it sucks. But I digress."

His face turned serious. "Enough niceties. I'll make this simple. You all know who I am, and what I can do. I'm contacting you all to offer you a proposal. I have an…interest in the Nephilim, but unfortunately I cannot locate her. Give her to me, and I will call off my Croats and let you finish your miserable existences in peace. No more destroying settlements, no more demons possessing your children or raids in the middle of the night. All you have to do is contact me with her location and I'll swing by and pick her up." His voice hardened. "If you refuse, I will destroy your camps one by one looking for her. And I will not be merciful. Your species is already almost extinct. Can you really afford to lose any more protecting one person? Think about it. But not for too long. Goodbye."

The screen flickered and went dead.

The room was silent for a long moment as the whole room stared first at the television and then at Eli. Slowly, a rumble began to build, voices rising higher and higher, until the sound was near cacophonic.

"Now hold up, hold up!" Dean yelled, getting on top of a table. The din died down as everyone stared at their fearless leader. "Nobody is handing anybody over to Lucifer!"

The noise started again and he held up his hands to quiet them. "Shut up! Listen, you know me. I'm not stupid, and I'm not sentimental. If I thought there was a snowball's chance in hell that he was telling the truth, I'd gift-wrap her and give her to Lucifer myself."

His eyes flickered to Eli and she smiled wryly; she knew he was telling the truth. Two years of hell on earth had changed him. "But trust me, handing her over is the _worst _thing in the world we can do." The crowd rumbled with questions, and he plowed through, keeping his voice at an even level to force everyone to stay quiet. "I can't… I can't explain it, but if Lucifer gets his hands on Eli, we're all fucked. Even more than we are now. This is not a game, people. This is life or death. No matter what he says, the truth is that the moment he gets her, we're all Croat food."

There was a low murmur of conversation. Then someone shouted: "But what if he's telling the truth?"

"Yeah, come on, Dean," another guy said, glancing back at a white-faced Eli. "It's just one woman."

"She's not a woman, she's a Nephilim," Dean snapped. "And I say she stays right here. Does anyone really want to contradict me?"

The crowd fell silent. "Good," Dean said, hopping off the table. "Now get back to bed. We'll discuss this more in the morning."

He met up with Castiel and Eli in one of the meeting rooms. Eli immediately surged forward.

"Dean, what the hell is going on?" she hissed in a low voice. "What does Lucifer want with me? What was all that talk about having to protect me?"

"We do have to protect you," he growled, shutting the door behind him and looking around the room suspiciously. Eli glared at him.

"Why?"

Satisfied that they were alone, Dean sighed and dropped into a chair, propping his feet on the dilapidated table. "About a month ago, we caught a demon two towns over," he started, pulling a warm beer from a carton by his chair and cracking it open. "He was …. upper level, to say the least. Didn't know where the Colt was, but he did have some interesting information about you."

He took a deep drink; Eli and Castiel just stared at him, waiting. In the past she would have yelled at him, told him to spit it out, but something in his manner lately unnerved her. It was cold, almost dead, and at times—like when he said that if it wasn't beneficial to him he would hand her over to Lucifer—he didn't even seem like Dean anymore. He looked at her over his beer, and she knew he realized exactly how they were all starting to feel about him.

"Apparently, you're some kind of…weapon," he finished, shrugging. "I don't know. Demon said that if Lucifer gets his hands on you he'll have enough juice to wipe out the whole planet. Good enough reason for me to keep you safe."

"A weapon?" Eli asked. "What…how?"

"The collar," Castiel replied roughly, and both turned to look at him. "I always suspected it, but this confirms it. Lucifer went through all that trouble to get the collar, which is a binding object for extreme power."

"What do you mean by extreme?" Dean demanded, pushing himself away from the table and approaching Castiel. "How extreme we talkin'?"

"God-like," Castiel said shortly, staring at the ground. "Heaven must have…locked away Eli's power, probably because Michael asked them too. But it stands to reason that if Lucifer has the collar, and wants Eli, then Eli must have the kind of power Heaven only whispers about."

"Well, what about us?" Dean asked, sounding excited, and Eli shot him a look. "How can we get at it?"

"Dude, I'm right here," she snapped.

"You can't," Castiel said shortly. "If they did bind her power, the magic would be so powerful, so ancient, that only an Archangel could release it."

"An Archangel like Lucifer," Dean said with understanding. "Fuck. Oh, fuck me. We gotta get out of here."

"Leave, now?" Eli asked incredulously as he made for the door. "Dean, it's the middle of the night and the outside is crawling with Croats."

"You think they're not gonna turn you in for a chance to stop the apocalypse?" Dean said hotly. "They have no reason to put that much trust in me. Until we figure things out, expect that anyone can betray us. Hell, if I were in their position, it's what I'd do." He wrenched open the door and dropped his voice as they moved into the hallway. "Grab your shit. We're going to Bobby's."

* * *

"Ya'll got the message too, huh," Bobby said in way of greeting as the three of them showed up at his front door. "Can't say I'm surprised."

"Yeah, and we booked it out of there as fast as we could," Dean said, moving swiftly into the house and fingering his gun nervously. The trip there had been long and dangerous; twice the reinforced Jeep had been ambushed by Croats. It still had guts and smears of red on the windshield.

"Hey Bobby," Eli said in an exhausted voice as she and Castiel entered behind Dean. She leaned down to give the wheelchair-bound soldier a hug.

"Ya'll want a beer?" he asked, rolling toward the kitchen. Eli glanced at Castiel and yawned hugely.

"Actually, all I want right now is to sleep my life away. You mind filling Bobby in on the details, Dean?"

"Sure," Dean said shortly, pacing, full of nervous energy. Outside, the sun was just beginning to crest the sky. "I couldn't sleep now anyway."

"Great," she said, taking Castiel's hand. They walked up the stairs in silence. It took all of Eli's energy to just unlace her shoes, pull off her pants and crawl into bed. Castiel followed her, curling her head into his chest so that she could feel his heartbeat.

She didn't even have to say a word; he could feel her desolation and panic as easily as if she was screaming it. "It's okay," he murmured into her hair as outside a lone Croat howled in the distance. "Everything is going to be okay."

She knew it was a lie, but she loved him for it.

Eli closed her eyes and slept.


	3. The Ladder Starts To Clatter

**Chapter 3: The Ladder Starts To Clatter**

_Well I believe it all is coming to an end  
Oh well, I guess, we're gonna pretend_

_

* * *

_

Eli should have known they were fucked when she found Bobby's suicide gun.

"Name's Camp Chitaqua," Bobby was saying over breakfast the next morning. "I've scoped it out as best I can. Seems to be some kind of abandoned commune. Totally self-sustaining—even has generators for electricity and hot water, though God knows how long they'll last before they give up for good." He pointed to a spot on the map. "'S about, oh, 20 miles from here, on clean roads. If y'all wanna new base of operations, I'd say this is your best bet."

"Awesome," Dean said listlessly, picking at his cereal made with powdered milk. Eli stood in the door and cleared her throat.

"Um…" she started, causing the two men to look up at her.

Dean whistled, sounding ever-so-slightly like his old self again. Bobby just rolled his eyes. "I reiterate," the old hunter said, pulling his ball cap down over his forehead. "Stupidest plan in the world. What is this, the Clark Kent school of disguise?"

"No one will know me, Bobby," Eli said, running her hands through her now-short, newly-brown hair. Her head felt strange, somehow lighter, and streaks of dye still lined the grooves of her fingers. "We're being selective about our refugees this time. No one knows Eli Grant. Just Elizabeth Graham."

"Okay, _Elizabeth_, howsabout you do me a favor and put these in my desk," Bobby said gruffly, rolling up the maps and handing them to Eli. "Top drawer on the left. While you're at it, bring me the whiskey from the bottom drawer. The good one, not the shit we found raiding that grocery store."

"Yes, sir," Eli said, smiling a little. She curled the wrinkled paper in her hands and moved into the next room, noting absentmindedly that it needed to be cleaned. Bobby had obviously tried, but it was difficult for a man in a wheelchair, and little piles of trash and dust lay everywhere: used cartons of cigarettes, gun shells, cans of food, even bits of personal items that were clearly not his, a doll, a ragged doily, a toy truck, remnants from when refugees once filled the place.

She reached the desk and absentmindedly opened the top right drawer, but noticed immediately that it was the wrong one. Instead of papers and pens it had only a half-smoked blunt, a photo of his long-dead wife, and a revolver which, when checked, was revealed to contain only a single bullet.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Eli spun around guiltily, still clutching the revolver in her hand. She gaped for a moment. "I, uh, eh…"

"I told you top _left_ drawer, idjit," Bobby snapped, wheeling over and snatching the gun. Castiel appeared at the top of the stairs, sleep still hanging heavy in his eyes, drawn by the ruckus, and Dean sidled in from the kitchen, looking moderately interested.

"Bobby, why does that gun only have one bullet?" Eli asked when she could finally speak.

He sighed, shoving the gun to the back of the drawer and closing it with more force than necessary. "Why do you think?" he growled, before spinning his chair around and rolling away, his shoulders hunched.

Eli caught Castiel's eye and shivered. She didn't know why, but something about the atmosphere in the room raised the hair on her arms and on the back of her neck, like someone was whispering in her ear: _This is important._

Why, she didn't know.

* * *

Camp Chitaqua was a surprisingly well-maintained plot of land. Croats hadn't even wrecked the place; it was guarded by huge fences topped with curling barbed wire, and was hauntingly desolate. If it was a commune in the past, Eli didn't want to know what kind of group kept such tight security. She also didn't want to know why it was empty, or what had happened to the people who once lived there.

They inspected it the next day, and by the following week refugees were showing up like they were drawn to Dean, which they probably were. He had sent out messages to those he trusted, organizing a ragtag army around him. People felt safe with him as their 'fearless leader.'

"Apparently," Castiel told her in a low voice as they were moving their few possessions into the small, freestanding cabin they had chosen for themselves, "things fell apart when we left Camp 1. I heard Dean talking about it with Bobby. Seems people turned on each other."

Eli swallowed over the huge lump in her throat and put down the box she was carrying. "Oh," she said softly, pushing limp, watery-brown hair out of her eyes.

Castiel watched her carefully. He had grown a slight beard, and was fitting into his ragged clothing with more ease, settling into the knowledge of being human. Now that he had learned how much to sleep, eat, how to bathe and function normally, he was able to stave off the near-overwhelming depression and act more like himself, even smile occasionally. Plus, with the frequent raids on grocery and liquor stores, all of them were drinking more than ever, numbing themselves to the world. He found that he liked alcohol quite a bit.

"It's not your fault," he finally said, putting down his own box and moving to her side. He rubbed her shoulders soothingly, amazed at how easily human contact came to him now, like being mortal made him fit into his body a little better. "Dean is right. You must be protected."

She rubbed her nose on her sleeve. "I know," she said, giving him a weak smile. "It's just…"

"Do I hear the tell-tale signs of crushing depression?" a moderately cheerful voice interrupted from the door. Chuck popped his head in the room, his beard and hair wilder than ever.

Eli grinned, a real smile. "Chuck!" she exclaimed, pulling him into one of her signature bone-crushing hugs. "When did you get here?"

"Just now," he said, coughing as she stepped away. "Jo's here too." The prophet peeked over her shoulder. "Hey, Cas. You look, uh…good."

He inclined his head. "Chuck. You look… inappropriately happy."

Eli sniffed him suspiciously. "Are you… are you high?" she asked, narrowing her eyes. He looked suddenly sheepish.

"It's been a rough year, okay?" he muttered defensively, and Eli managed a real laugh for the first time in a long time.

"Damnit, Chuck, you've been holding out on us? I thought we were friends."

His slightly-dilated eyes lit up. "Want some? I got plenty. Raided a farm a few weeks back, and whoo-ee, you should have seen what they were growing. Hybrids like you've never seen. It was a thing of beauty."

"Marijuana?" Castiel asked warily, furrowing his brow. "Do you really think that's such a…"

Chuck looped his arm around the mortal angel's shoulders. "You, my friend, need to live a little," he said, and giggled.

Eli took his other arm. "I mean, really, it's the end," she said, kissing his cheek quickly. "That's what vice is for."

Castiel wasn't sure if he agreed.

* * *

He agreed.

* * *

For the end of the world, there were good moments. On nights when they weren't on missions (for food, medication, raids, or the ever-present Colt hunt) Eli and Castiel would lay in bed, talking for hours. That was when both of them felt the safest, the most at peace, like the apocalypse hadn't really happened and they were just two people in their home.

Eli stared at the ceiling, marveling at how the moonlight filled the room, leaking through the barred windows like bright water. She took a deep pull and held it in, before breathing out and watching the thin white smoke spiral above her head and handing the joint to Cas.

They were both naked, half-tangled in sheets; he was on his back, his head cushioned by her bare stomach and letting out small sighs of pleasure as she absentmindedly combed her fingers through his dark hair. His eyes were hazy, his handsome face more relaxed than it ever was during the day, when they had raids and missions and hungry, sick refugees to worry about. He too watched the smoke spiral above them with dazed fascination.

"Does this ever feel wrong to you?" Eli asked, and he tilted his head to look at her face, surprised. She laughed a little and took the joint back from his long fingers. "Not _this,_ but this." She waved her hand around her head before bringing it to her lips and inhaling deeply.

"The room?" he asked, confused. Eli coughed.

"This world," she said. "This reality. Sometimes…" She trailed off, fingers still stroking his hair. "I feel like we took a wrong turn somewhere. Like none of this was supposed to happen. Like when I close my eyes I can almost see another reality, another way things could have gone. The right way."

"And what is this world you see?" he asked, taking the thin white roll from her and breathing it in.

"Mmm, better," she said absentmindedly. "Like it was before. A world without Croats, without the Devil walking the earth. A world where we can walk in the sunlight and go to the movies and buy food from the grocery store. A world where I'm still _blonde_."

"Everyone has those dreams, Eli," he said, rolling over to rest his chin on her stomach and staring at her with large blue eyes. "We all want the world to be what it once was."

She shook her head. "No, it's more than that. Like I'm trapped in a fun-house mirror, and I'm banging my hands against the glass but I can't get out." She inhaled, letting the smoke filter slowly through her lips. "This is wrong," she said decisively. "This is not the way things should have gone."

"Hm," he said, then pulled himself up so that they were eye level and pinched the joint out before putting it on the three-legged bedside table. "Marry me," he said seriously.

She stared at him, open-mouthed, before sputtering: "_What_?"

"I know it's not really an institution anymore," he said, propping himself up on one elbow to gaze her with the furrowed, inscrutable look that was a leftover from his days as an angel. "And this may be the wrong world, and maybe things didn't happen the way they were supposed to, and maybe we'll die tomorrow. But…" He hesitated and sighed, looking away, squinting into the silver moonlight, his voice beautifully low and raspy. "There's a ritual that angels can do to bind souls together, like a brand, so that each one belongs to the other, forever. I should have… I wanted to…" He closed his eyes as if reliving some great disappointment. "But I did not, stupidly. I regret this." He looked down at her and his eyes softened. He brushed a lock of dyed hair away from her cheek and traced her freckles with the pad of his thumb. "Marry me, Eli."

She smiled, blinking back tears, and cupped his face in her hand. "What took you so long?" she murmured, and kissed him. He kissed her back, then lifted her out of the bed and swung her over his shoulder. She shrieked with laughter, and covered her face in her hands, trying not to wake the whole commune.

"What are you doing?" she asked, giggling breathlessly.

"Taking you to the shower," he said in a nearly deadpan voice that had a smile curled up in its edges. "You're awfully dirty."

She laughed again. "So is my fiancé." He put her down in the shower and turned on the water, letting it run scalding over their bodies. She beamed at him. "Thank God for hot water and generators."

He kissed her, hard. "Thank God for you."

At that point, there were still some good times.

They didn't last long.

* * *

About a month later, their sleep was interrupted yet again by Sam's lazy drawl crackling this time out of Castiel's walkie-talkie.

"Really, must I do this again?" it sighed, jolting them awake. "I'm getting bored."

"Oh shit," she muttered, crawling out of bed. "Shit shit shit. Not again."

"So I hear that our little Eli skipped town after my last message," the voice continued blithely. Eli grabbed the walkie and tried to turn it off, but nothing happened. She spun it around and removed the batteries, but the Devil's voice continued to drone. "Too bad I had to flatten the place when I found out. And now she's hiding somewhere else. Little birdie tells me she might have even changed her name. Ouch. I'm hurt." Outside, the discontented mumbles of people being woken from sleep sounded, and a second later there was pounding on their door.

"Incoming," Dean yelled, walking into the room just as Eli pulled on a bathrobe. "We're fucked," he announced, waving a shorthand radio. "Again."

Cas had magically managed to pull pants on and spoke to Dean as Eli changed behind a scrim. "No one knows her as Eli here," he rasped, his voice still thick from sleep. "We've been safe all these months."

"So I'm going to say this again," Sam's voice was saying. "Give me the Nephilim and I'll spare your lives."

"Yeah, and that's great for us, but until we get this situation under control I say the two of you set up camp somewhere else."

"Bobby's," Castiel stated. Dean nodded.

"Only safe place, now."

"No matter what they tell you, one girl is not worth the death of humanity," Lucifer said calmly.

"For how long?" Eli asked, coming back into view. She was wearing a wife-beater and tucking her cargo pants into her combat boots, her short brown hair sticking up at all angles. Around her neck was a silver chain with a gold ring dangling from it, identical to the one around Cas' neck. "We can't run forever, Dean."

"Not forever," he promised. "Just until I make sure that you'll be safe. Now get to Bobby's. I'll contact you when this dies down."

Eli grabbed her emergency duffel bag off of the floor. From the walkie and the radio, Sam's voice was still talking. "I'm waiting, Eli," it said, in a tone that any other time, coming from any other throat, would have sounded kind. "I won't wait much longer."

* * *

"Second time that bastard's woken me up in the middle of the night," Bobby grumbled as he opened the door for them. "I'm getting tired of it."

"We all are," Eli said in an exhausted voice as they moved past his seated figure and into the house. She dropped her bag and gun on the floor and stretched while Castiel immediately headed to the bathroom to wash his hands of Croat blood. "But Dean thinks he can salvage the situation. No one knows who I really am. I think we'll be able to stay, this time."

"You damn well better hope so," Bobby said, wheeling into the kitchen and returning with three beers in slightly dirty, dented cans. "We can't keep moving every time Lucifer decides to send out his little message. We're running out of military bases and conveniently abandoned communes within driving distance."

"The roads are getting worse, too," Castiel said, emerging from the bathroom. "Barely drivable anymore. Gas is running low. And the Croats are growing bolder."

"We're just a barrel of laughs tonight, aren't we," Eli muttered. Bobby shot her a look.

"We're all putting a lot of lives in danger to save your ass," he said sharply, drinking his beer with shaking hands. "Dean damn well better be right about you being important."

"He is," Castiel snapped in a low, dangerous voice, fixing Bobby with an unnerving stare.

Bobby scoffed. "Yeah, because you're the most impartial of judges."

"Bobby, what are you saying?" Eli asked warily. The old hunter glanced at her from under his filthy ball cap, then looked away.

"Nothing," he said morosely. "Just being grumpy. End of the world will do that to you. Best ya'll go to sleep now. It's gonna be a rough couple days until all of this dies down."

"Hn," Castiel said noncommittally, still watching Bobby with narrowed eyes.

Eli felt something cold, like ice water, trickle down her spine, but then Bobby turned and rolled into the kitchen and Castiel held his newly-calloused hand out to her and the feeling broke.

What came next was the kind of shock that not even living in a post-apocalyptic, zombie-infested world could have prepared her for.


	4. Furies Breathing Down Your Neck

**Chapter 4: Furies Breathing Down Your Neck**

_I believe the world is burning to the ground  
Oh well, I guess we're gonna find out_

_

* * *

_

Castiel had learned to sleep, but still didn't keep normal waking hours. He often woke in the middle of the night and prowled around like a dog guarding his home, checking doors and fences, making sure that everyone was safe in their beds.

It was his shout that woke her that night. That and the shot.

Years of living in fear had made her a light sleeper, and the blast jolted Eli instantly awake. Her hand was on her gun before she even registered what she was doing or where she was. After a moment she remembered that she was in Bobby's house, and the tone of the raised voices downstairs informed her immediately that Croats had not gotten in. She knew, suddenly and with that horrible, sinking feeling in her stomach of naiveté being ripped away, what was happening, and she nearly flew down the stairs.

Castiel was crumpled near Bobby's desk, his face a mask of pain. He was glaring at Bobby with something very close to hate in his eyes. The older hunter was seated near the far wall, close to the kitchen door, a rifle in his hand and one sleeve rolled up to reveal a long, bloody gash in his arm. A red-dipped butcher knife lay shining and sticky on the carpet.

"Just stay down, boy," Bobby was growling, finger on the trigger. "Or I shoot the other foot as well." Behind his head, like a bizarre mural, was a mostly finished angel-banishing sigil, scrawled in the hunter's own blood.

"Bobby!" she gasped, unable to help herself. He swung the gun on her and she raised hers instinctively.

"Drop it, Eli," he said in a frighteningly calm, chill voice. "Or I swear to God I'll blow his brains out."

"Shoot him," Castiel ground out. Bobby aimed his rifle at Castiel's head.

"You could try," he said to Eli. "But then we'd just have to see who's the quicker shot."

Eli didn't hesitate. She immediately threw her gun to the floor and held up her hands. Castiel groaned, his foot still gushing blood, and she gave him a weak smile. "I'm sorry, Cas, but I can't lose you." She blinked back tears, then turned to Bobby. "Don't do this, Bobby. You're like a father to me, you know that." Eli never found out what had happened to her real parents; most likely they were killed when the Croat infestation first exploded. "You're one of the only people I've got left in the whole world."

"I'm sorry, Eli, I really am," he said gruffly. "But the way I see it, world can't get any worse than it already is. We've already lost. If we have any chance to stop this and make peace with the devil, then we gotta take it." He paused and lowered his voice to a sad whisper. "If there was any other way, girl, any way in the world, I would do it. But I gotta hand you over. It's the only chance we got."

"Lucifer will destroy this planet," Castiel snarled, holding on to the edge of the desk and pulling himself to a half-standing position. Unseen to the others, he moved his hand behind the desk and cautiously began to open a drawer. "You'll be giving him his best weapon, don't you understand that? And once he has her there will be nothing to stop him from killing all of you, killing every last human and sending all of their souls to hell."

"We're already in hell," Bobby insisted, but Castiel just shook his head.

"You have no idea what hell is."

"What were you gonna do, Bobby?" Eli asked quietly, drawing his attention back to her. She indicated the sigil. "Banish my soul, so I wouldn't be able to fight back?"

"It would'a been quiet and simple," Bobby said, tears shining in his eyes. "No one would have gotten hurt. Then he had to walk in on me making the thing…"

"You know what he'll do to me, Bobby?" Eli asked, her voice haunted. She took a step closer, toes sinking into the dirty carpet. "I've had dreams about it. Most nights I can block him out, but sometimes I see…" She trailed off, then continued in a slightly stronger voice. "He'll rip me apart, pull me into a thousand pieces and then put me back together again. He'll make me…something else. Something not even remotely human. And he will have me flatten cities and cleanse this planet of everything beautiful." She reached a trembling hand to him, her eyes red and wet. "Bobby, if I thought handing myself over would help in any way, I would have done it a long time ago. This isn't about self-preservation. This is about saving the world."

Bobby stared at her for a long moment, the gun slack in his wrist. Then he shook his head and tightened his grip, a final, brutally simplistic movement. "Seems to me there's no world left to save. I'm sorry, Eli." He reached up one bloody hand and moved to finish the symbol on the wall, the gun still pointed unwaveringly in their direction. "If it makes you feel any better, I plan to use that one bullet of mine as soon as I'm done," he promised in a low, choked voice.

"I had the same idea," Castiel rasped, and before Bobby could respond he lifted the ancient revolver from the drawer he had quietly been opening and shot Bobby in the chest with its single bullet.

The old hunter gasped, the rifle slipping from his fingers, but he still attempted to turn and place his hand against the wall. Eli dove to the ground for her gun, lifted it with both hands and shot him point-blank. He groaned and tumbled to the ground in a heap, the wheelchair stained red, two holes through its back.

Eli stared at his corpse for a long moment, then dropped her gun. She closed her eyes and took a long, shaking breath to stave off hysterical tears, and turned to Castiel, who had slumped to the ground in pain, his injured foot held out in front of him.

"Oh, God," she breathed, crouching by his side. She pulled a knife from her pocket and cut away his shoe to reveal a sock soaked in blood, and beneath that, a foot with its delicate bones shattered by the bullet still buried inside.

"Will I… be able to walk again?" he croaked. She gave him a brave smile as she grabbed a random shirt from a pile on the floor and wrapped it around his foot to staunch the bleeding.

"Sure you will. We'll get you back to the compound and the doctor will get the bullet out. After that I'll be able to help you along. It'll take time, but you're damn lucky you have a wife with healing powers," she said, sniffling a little. "Can you get up?"

"Yes, but, the compound…" he weakly protested. She pulled him to his feet, supporting his weight with her body.

"We were safe there before, we'll be safe again. Besides, we can't stay here." She gave a brief, fleeting glance at Bobby's prone body. "Come on. Sun is coming up; you know the Croats hate sunrise. Best time of the day to travel. Let's take you home, love."

"What are we going to tell Dean?" Castiel asked quietly as they limped to the door. Eli kicked it open without a look back, her face grim.

"The truth," she said, helping him to the car as the sun crested the horizon. The Croats had died down, off to wherever they lurked during the day, waiting for the coolness of night to roam in packs on the abandoned streets. "The time for sparing feelings has long passed. Especially when it comes to Dean."

Castiel said nothing, just attempted to ignore the throbbing pain in his foot. He watched the rising sun and tried to remember when the beginning of a new day meant joy. He couldn't.

* * *

Even with Eli helping him along, it still took Castiel a month to walk again.

He found that he hated hospitals, especially ill-cleaned makeshift ones in compounds staffed entirely by one real doctor, a dentist, an intern, and a few perpetually queasy 'doctors-in-training.' He hated needles sterilized in boiling water and hard cots and the moans of fellow patients. Luckily Eli, with her gentle healing powers and stern words to some very nervous 'nurses' managed to get him out in two days and back to their cabin. He found, quickly enough, that he hated crutches, too, and being injured, and pain.

He guessed what it really boiled down to was that he hated being human.

Bobby was right. The world had gone to hell. But, Castiel thought, watching her delicately replace his blood-stained bandages with clean ones, her freckled face scrunched up in concentration, at least he had her. She made the world bearable.

He caught her chin and lifted it so that she was looking at him. "You look tired," he murmured, noting the shadowed blue smudges beneath her eyes, how her skin was paler than usual, almost sickly. "Have you been sleeping?"

Eli checked that her bandages were in place and sank down next to him on the bed. "Not really," she admitted. He studied her carefully, noticing that she avoided his eyes when speaking.

"You're keeping something from me," he stated. "What is it?"

She coughed, twirling her ring on its silver chain. Castiel had returned with the rings a few weeks before, after a raid on a town, and she didn't know if they had come from an abandoned jewelry store or from abandoned bodies. It didn't matter; she loved them. The symbol stayed the same, and everything was tainted by death nowadays. "It's Lucifer," she finally said. "He's found a way into my dreams."

To his credit, Castiel didn't freak out. He was just quiet for a moment, then asked: "Why didn't you inform me of this sooner?"

"I didn't want to worry you," she said, then shook her head. "No, that's not it. Not really. I was afraid that if I told someone it would make it more real…and mean that I couldn't handle it myself."

"You can't do everything alone, Eli," he reprimanded, and she smiled a little, a thin, watery smile that looked like it was difficult to make.

"I know. I have you." She brushed hair from his eyes, noticing that as it got longer it began to curl, soft waves around his face. "You need a haircut. And a shave."

"Don't change the subject," he said, catching her hand. "How do you think he is getting in?"

Eli sighed, entwining her fingers in his and bringing them to her face to kiss his knuckles. "I think it's stress. I'm so worried all the time, so on edge, and I've…" She trailed off, averting her eyes.

"You've been draining your power helping me to heal," he said, with dawning understanding. "And you've been worrying about me, haven't you?"

"I know being human has been rough," she said, shrugging, then looked at him. "I can't help but worry. I know how hard this has been for you."

He cupped her face in his hands and pulled her toward him until their foreheads were touching. He stared into her eyes from two inches away. "I am fine, Eli," he rasped softly, stroking her jaw with his thumb. "You never have to worry about me. And my foot will heal on its own. I do not want you to make yourself sick over me."

She blinked back tears, like talking about her exhaustion had made it rise up and overtake her senses. Her head pounded, her mouth was dry, her eyes wet; she was so tired, so bone-dead tired that it was hard to move, hard to think.

"Too late," she whispered, pulling away and rubbing her eyes with the back of her hand. "I'm fine, really," she insisted. "Nothing would help anyway. Once he's found a way in, it's near-impossible to kick him back out again."

Castiel stared at her for a long moment, tipping his head like a bird, his hands clasped pensively in front of him. The pose was a throwback from his days as a stoic angel, and it made her smile, to see that some things hadn't changed, would never change.

Finally he shook himself out of his thoughts. "I have an idea."

* * *

"Morphine?" Eli asked skeptically. They were standing in the 'hospital', a large room filled with cots and a small partitioned area for the one doctor to see patients.

"Possibly. I may be completely wrong, but then again, I don't have much experience in dealings with the devil," the doctor said, propping herself on the edge of the desk and fixing Eli with a scrutinizing stare. She was a once-pretty woman in her mid-thirties with unfortunate scars criss-crossing her face; the rumor was that she had waded into a mob of Croats in an attempt to save her son, and had somehow made it out alive. Her son didn't. "But it might work as a short-term fix, just to get your immune system back up to speed. Kind of like an induced coma."

"Exactly like an induced coma," Eli muttered. Dean had known the doctor somehow, back in his pre-apocalyptic life (or simply Before, as it was now called, the capitalization evident even in conversation, because really, what other Before could they ever be talking about?), and more amazingly, he trusted her. Something about having saved her life once or twice, or knowing how much she loved her child, or some other bullshit story. Eli cynically thought that it was because he had slept with her Before, when her face wasn't scarred and Dean was naïve, that he trusted her because he had to believe in some of the things he believed Before or he would go crazy.

"Well, yes," the doctor admitted; Eli realized belatedly that she didn't even know the woman's name, which made it easier in a way, when they inevitably died. "But it's a healing process. Plus, no dreams. Knocks you out so deeply that no one can get in there. You'll be safe and allow your body to rest and rejuvenate."

"It's the best plan we've got, Eli," Castiel said quietly. Eli turned to him with reddened eyes.

"But what if it backfires?" she asked, fear evident in her voice. "What if he's there and I won't be able to wake up?"

"That won't happen," Castiel insisted, squeezing her hand. "And I'll be there the whole time. I won't leave you, not for an instant." He lowered his voice. "You need this, Eli. You need to be strong if you're ever going to keep him out of your head."

She took a deep breath, and finally nodded. "Fine, okay. Just do it."

What she didn't say was: _I think this is stupid and dangerous and God, I don't want to do it, I don't want to take that chance of being locked up in my own brain with no escape, but I love you and I can't stand to see you look so sad, so fine, okay, I'll do it. For you, because you're the only thing I have left._

Castiel tilted his head and gave her the shy half-smile that still made her heart flutter.

It was the wrong decision.


	5. Listen To Yourself Churn

**AN:** Thank you everyone for the wonderful response to this story. It means the world to me!

And if you didn't know: _Book Three: As We Know It_ is now up and kicking! So check it out!

Now back to your regularly scheduled zombie apocalypse.

* * *

**Chapter 5: Listen To Yourself Churn**

_It's gone, gone, baby, it's all gone  
There's no one on the corner and there's no one at home_

_

* * *

_

It started innocently enough.

"Now just count backward from ten," the doctor said, positioning the suspended bag of clear fluid over Eli's head. The syringe was already in position, the needle threaded into her vein.

"T..ten," Eli started in a shaky voice. She tried to swallow but her mouth felt dry, her throat like sandpaper. "Nine…" Castiel was holding her hand, but she still didn't feel safe. "Eight. Seven." The room started to darken, cast into shades of black and grey, tilting and pitching. "Six. Five. Four." Oddly enough, the only thing that didn't move, that didn't grow darker each second was Castiel, his eyes blue as the pre-war sky, his aura lighting up the room like a candle at night. "Three. Two."

Everything descended into darkness. Subconsciously, Eli smiled, shifting and settling, waiting to finally rest. Everything was so calm…

She was standing over her body.

Eli blinked, then stared down at her hands, then back at the body lying on the bed. "What the fuck…" she breathed. "Oh no, oh no no no…"

"How long will she be out?" Castiel was asking the doctor. She smiled and patted his shoulder.

"About twelve or so hours. Why don't you rest yourself, or get something to eat? She won't wake up before then, and you're not going to help at all by…"

"I'm staying here," he insisted. "I promised I would."

The doctor rolled her eyes but still smiled. "Stubborn. All right, then, I'll have one of my docs-in-training bring you something to eat."

"Oh no no no no," Eli kept repeating. She crouched down next to Castiel and attempted to touch his hand, but her skin went right through it like she was made of air. "Cas? Cas!" She waved her arms in front of his face, but he just continued to look downward with a pensive expression, his brow rumpled with worry and exhaustion. "Come on, tell me you can hear me. You used to be an angel, for God's sake!"

"But he's not an angel anymore," a voice pointed out from behind her. Eli spun around, her hands reaching for guns that weren't there. "Just a human, and not much of one at that."

"You…can't be here," Eli gasped, dangerously close to hyperventilating (_but how could she_, her mind wondered, _when at the moment she didn't have lungs_). "I'm not dreaming."

Lucifer inspected his nails with faked disinterest. "No, but you are having an out-of-body experience. And while I still can't pinpoint exactly where you are physically, I can easily zero in on your soul, especially when it's wandering around all helpless in the void." He grinned suddenly, all teeth. "Remind me to thank Castiel later for giving me this opportunity."

"You son of a bitch," she growled, but inside she was screaming. She didn't want to show it, didn't want anyone to know how deep it really went, but she was _terrified_ of Lucifer. Down to the marrow of her bones, she was terrified. His presence sent her lizard-brain screaming into overdrive, telling her to run, hide, jump off the nearest cliff, shoot herself in the head, anything to get away from the monster in Sam's skin. She tamped it down as best she could and covered it up with bravado and anger, but it was still there, _screaming._ And she knew, at her very core, that he could hear it, and he liked it.

"Really, Eli? Are we reduced to name-calling?" Lucifer gave her a patronizing look. "I've been more than polite to you, I would hope that you would offer the same respect to me."

"Polite?" she hissed incredulously. "Go to hell."

"I _have_ been polite," he said, folding Sam's long-fingered hands neatly in front of him. "I could have bulldozed this planet looking for you. I didn't."

"Oh yeah, you've been _super_ kind to the planet," she said sarcastically, her words shaking a little. He ignored her.

"I gave you the opportunity to come to me of your own free will. I should have known you'd be stubborn, though. You do hang around Dean an awful lot. Tell me, how is big brother?"

"He is _not_ your brother," she growled. "You are _not_ Sam, you evil piece of trash. You're the thing that killed him."

"Oh, he's very much alive," Lucifer said, tapping his temple. "In here." He paused. "Where was I? Oh yes, how good I've been to you." He smiled a little, the expression strange and waxy on his face, like he didn't know how to work his muscles properly. For the first time she noticed that he was wearing, bizarrely, a pin-striped suit, like the kind old gangsters used to wear. "I can spare your parents from hell."

"Bullshit," she snapped. "My parents were good people, and you have no power over…"

"Don't I?" he asked, tilting his head. "I do have to clear up some misconceptions for you, Elijah." He held out his hand. "Come with me."

She backed up, shaking her head. "You're out of your fucking mind."

"Quite possibly," Lucifer said in a bland tone. "I was alone in that pit for an awfully long time. But it doesn't matter. It's easier to do this when anchored to someone, but since you're being stubborn again, we'll have to do it the hard way. Or have you forgotten that you're just a soul now?" He leaned forward, tempering his threatening words with a smile. "For the next twelve hours, Elijah Grant, you're mine. And time runs differently on the astral plane."

The world pitched and rolled. Eli tried to hold on to something but she slid through everything like it was made of smoke. She found herself falling, down and down and down, through the earth, through the molten core of it into something deeper and hotter and darker. And there was pain; not hers, she knew that, but it was like the pain of a billion souls was making its way through her mind, screaming endlessly. Eli was screaming too.

Fingers brushed her forehead, and the pain stopped, like someone had flicked off a switch. "There," his voice said smugly. "Told you it was easier to do when anchored."

Eli cracked her eyes open, and instantly regretted it.

They were standing on a wall, which was hard to tell as there didn't seem to be any up or down, just haphazard pieces of solid ground floating in a sea of stretched and tortured bodies. Her hands flew to her mouth.

"Oh, dear God," she breathed. Beside her, Lucifer smirked.

"Guess again."

"This is hell," she said numbly, hands falling from her mouth. "Why…why did you take me to hell? Why are you showing me this?"

"Hard to stand, isn't it?" Lucifer said conversationally, shoving Sam's hands into his pockets. "It's a terrible fate. Demons…well, most demons used to be human. You knew that, right? So they belong here. Humans and their ilk—they all belong here."

"Crowley was right," she said in a dull voice, watching a man not thirty feet from her be disemboweled by a smirking, nasty little creature, his guts spooling like rope into the void. His head was thrown back like he wanted to scream, but his throat had been torn out. "You do hate the demons. There will be no paradise for them."

"Mmm, no, there won't be," Lucifer agreed. "Paradise will be reserved for those more worthy."

Eli turned haunted eyes to him. "Who?" she asked. "The other angels are gone. You hate humanity. Who is left?"

Lucifer just gave her a secretive smile and held out his hand. "Come with me. I have something else to show you."

As much as she hated him, Eli hated hell more. She took his hand, disgusted by how his fingers clenched around hers possessively, and then the world tilted and she was falling again.

This time, everything was quiet. Eli opened her eyes to find them standing in a lonely field, which stretched on forever, no horizon line in sight. It conveyed the feeling of great space and great emptiness. She wrenched her hand out of Lucifer's and backed away nervously, eyes still scanning the landscape. Above her was flat and white, not because of clouds, but because there was nothing there. No sky or ceiling. Just…nothing.

"Where are we this time?" she breathed, looking down, trying to stem the vertigo that washed over her at the sight of that great yawning nothing.

"Heaven."

His words hit her like a punch to the gut. "No…oh, no no no. _No._ What happened to it?"

"The angels left," Lucifer said with a shrug. "God is…well, who knows where God is anymore. Not here. They left the lights burning and the doors unlocked, so I came in."

She turned to him with horror, wishing as she always did that it was not Sam's once-gentle face staring back at her. "It's empty," she croaked. He crouched, fingering the dry grass pensively, pulling it out of the ground in little chunks, leaving bare earth behind.

"All I did was kick the squatters out." He stood, wiping his hands of dirt, and looked around pensively, his pin-striped suit immaculate. "So you see, Eli, this is _my_ Heaven now, just like it's _my_ hell and _my _earth." He looked at her, his eyes chill and very, very old. "_My _collar. _My _dog."

"My parents…" she croaked, trying to stop the tears that were burning the back of her eyes from slipping down her face. She would not cry in front of this monster. "My friends, everyone who has died… Ellen, Bobby…"

"Burning on the rack right now," Lucifer said cheerfully. "Would you like to see them?"

She glared at him with pure hatred. "You _monster_," she spat. "You evil, twisted…"

"Save the insults," he said. "They're unnecessary, considering that any pain your loved ones are suffering is your own fault."

"What does that mean?" she asked, crossing her arms. It was getting harder and harder not to cry, not to break down and curl into a ball and sob until she couldn't breathe. He watched her with wary eyes, seeing despite her bravado how close she was to collapsing. She knew that look, knew that he was calculating in that fucked-up head of his just how much more it would take to break her.

"All of this running and hiding," he said finally, "is very counter-productive. Did you think that I would take your power and give you nothing in return? I am not that cruel, Eli. I may seem it to you, but I am not that cruel. I do have a plan. For a better world. A _perfect _world. Help me achieve that world and I will see to it that all of humanity gets to go to Heaven. They're going to die anyway. I think that's more than fair."

"You're _lying_," she hissed. "Why would you ever let humans go to Heaven? You hate them."

"I won't have any need for Heaven anymore," he said patiently, as if trying to explain something to an infant. "I'll have my paradise on earth. Let the humans have their life after death. I won't care a bit."

"And what is your paradise?" she asked, afraid of the answer. "You've wiped everything else. The angels are gone. You hate the demons. What else is there?"

"Come on, Eli, are you really that naïve?" he asked, smiling a little with his waxy face. "It's almost cute."

"Just _say it_!" she screamed, balling her hands into fists, tears leaking out of her eyes despite her best efforts.

Lucifer stepped closer until he was only a foot away, then leaned in and said, very softly: "When things go bad, the best thing to do is wipe the slate clean and start anew. Angels can not procreate —we're born of fire, not genetics. But a Nephilim could create a race of demi-gods without even batting an eyelash."

She backpedaled away as fast as she could, nearly tripping over her own feet. "You're out of your mind," she gasped.

"Perfect, immortal creatures," he continued as if he hadn't heard her. "Completely loyal, completely powerful. A paradise of my own."

"Oh, God, I think I'm gonna be sick," she stuttered, hands clutching her mouth. He waved his hand at her, shaking his head.

"Oh don't worry, copulation is not necessary…but certainly not discouraged." He smirked. "It's a miracle. God did create Adam out of clay, after all."

She stared at him furiously, trying to force her anger to overcome the disgust and sadness writhing around in her gut. "And you think I'm just going to hand myself over to you and create some Stepford-world of demonic brood just for…"

"The salvation of the human race?" Lucifer finished for her. "The safe-keeping and happiness of the souls of everyone you've ever loved? Yeah, I kinda do."

Despair was winning out over anger. She wiped her eyes and took a deep breath, trying not to sniffle. Around her, the air was perfectly still, fake, the nothing that was the sky stretching out without end. "Well, I hate to disappoint you, but…"

"Castiel will be there, too," he interrupted calmly, stopping her in her tracks. "Heaven, I mean. Happier than he's ever been in this life, that's for sure. Say no and he'll be flayed on the rack every second of every day from here to eternity. I know many a demon that would just _love _to sink their claws into good ol' Castiel."

She couldn't breathe. "You think I'm that easily manipulated, don't you?" she finally croaked out. "You think you can just say his name and I…" She trailed off, stifling a panic attack.

Lucifer looked at her with oddly colorless eyes, like his presence had leeched Sam's body of everything resembling her friend. "Yes, as a matter of fact, I do. Love is always the easiest emotion to manipulate."

Hatred filled her, dark and thick, seeping right down to her bones and blood. "Send me back," she growled, fixing her reddened gaze on the fallen angel. "Send me back _right now_."

"And why would I want to do that?" Lucifer asked smugly. "When we have so much time together…"

"Send me back!" she screamed, lunging at him. "Send me back! Send me back, you son of a bitch, or I will bury myself in a fucking _volcano_ to get away from you!" He grabbed her wrists but she twisted out of his grip, shoving him hard, trying to reach his throat. "Send me back! _Send me back! Send me…_"

* * *

"…_back!"_ Eli howled, shooting straight up in the hospital bed, startling Castiel, who had been quietly dozing at her side. "Send me back! Send me back!"

Castiel grabbed her hands, trying to calm her down. "No!" she screamed, as if not recognizing him. "No no no no no _no no no…"_

"What the hell is going on, Doc?" he yelled. The doctor ran in to the room frantically, watching Eli scream.

"Hold her still!" she commanded. Castiel seized Eli's shoulders as the doctor jabbed a needle into her arm. After a few seconds the screaming stopped, and Eli slumped back onto the bed, her eyes hazy, clothes drenched in sweat. "It's not going to knock her out," the doctor promised as Castiel removed his hands from her shoulders and sat on the cot next to her, brushing damp brown hair from her face. "Just calm her down." She glanced at her watch. "But I don't understand. It's only been four hours. There's no way she should have woken up yet."

"Guess things didn't go exactly as planned," said a new voice, and they turned to see Dean standing in the doorway, his green military jacket rumpled, eyes tired and shadowed. "And believe you me, we're gonna want to hear whatever it is she has to say when she's not all drugged up."


	6. Offer Me Solutions

**Chapter 6: Offer Me Solutions, Offer Me Alternatives**

_I sat down on the street took a look at myself  
Said: "Where you going man? You know the world is headed for hell."  
Say your goodbyes if you've got someone you can say goodbye to._

_

* * *

_

"I'm telling you, I don't remember anything, okay?"

"You woke up screaming like a lunatic, Eli. Clearly something happened."

"_I_ _don't remember_. Jesus, Dean, lay off. I'd tell you if I knew anything!"

"See, that's the thing: I'm not so sure you would!"

Dean and Eli were in the war room, yelling at each other from opposite ends of the table. Both had their hands flat on its surface and were leaning in like they wanted to crawl over the wooden barrier and start smacking the other around. Castiel, still on crutches, hovered in the background, watching the fight with wary eyes.

"So that's what it comes down to," Eli snapped. "You don't trust me."

"'Course I trust you, Eli!" he said, and his tone of voice conveyed the word _idiot _even though he didn't say it. "You're one of the few people left on the planet that I do trust. But desperate people do desperate things. Now, something happened to you when you were under, and I _know_ you remember at least part of it."

Eli stepped back from the table, her skin greyish in the dim light, weary and prematurely lined. "I'm sorry, Dean," she said softly. "But I can't help you. I don't remember."

"Bullshit!" While Eli's voice had dropped in pitch, Dean continued to yell. "Now I am going to…"

"_I don't remember!"_

"How can you say…"

"What are you thinking…"

"..Something so stupid…"

"…you incredible douchebag, I could just…"

"…when we all know…"

"…punch you in the _face _sometimes…"

"Enough!" Castiel finally shouted, stopping the overlapping argument with a yell powerful enough that it was reminiscent of his days as an angel. He pulled himself up on his crutches, glaring at Dean. "If Eli says she doesn't remember, then she doesn't remember, and screaming at her will do nothing." He looked between the two of them, his voice suddenly pleading. "Don't you understand? This is what Lucifer wants. To break us up, make us turn on each other. We can't give in to it. _We have to trust._"

"But she…" Dean started again. Castiel cut him off with a look.

"This argument is _over_," he growled. The dynamic shifted, and for a moment Castiel was back in control, and Dean was the one following orders.

"Fine," he said shortly. "I'm starving anyway. All of this yelling is making me hungry." He shot Eli one last distrustful glance and marched out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

Eli sagged against the table, her heart beating like a hummingbird's wings in her throat. "Thanks," she said simply, pressing a palm to her forehead.

Castiel merely stared at her. "Do you really not remember anything?" he asked, tipping his head. Eli closed her eyes.

"No," she lied. He continued to watch her, a guarded look on his face, but when she refused to lift her head he finally sighed and limped out of the room, leaving her alone.

* * *

That evening, for the first time in a long time, Eli decided to watch the sun set.

She perched on the roof of the long communal building that served as the kitchen, storage facilities, meeting rooms, and day care. It was cement and flat, covered with graffiti and bird crap and a thin film of ash.

In front of her stretched the world. The sunset was beautiful that night, gleaming red and gold; it blazed over the husks of burnt-out buildings beyond the commune walls, some still flaming; it illuminated the skeletons of abandoned cars forever silenced on long, silver stretches of highway. It shone orange against the polluted river that gurgled by, the foam on the top like dirty ice cream, tires and bodies sticking like toys out of the sludge. The wind still smelled of smoke and the grit of burning plastic. In the distance, the Croats began to howl, preparing themselves for a night of hunting, though their prey was growing scarce. Eli had a feeling that they would die out soon, leaving this world bare.

But the sunset was so, so beautiful.

She glanced down at the dim compound, the buildings casting long blue shadows on the ground, premature twilight. Dean was getting ready for a mission; he was hunched in the center of a group of men, speaking in serious tones, his green military jacket a washed-out grey in the half-light. She could see Chuck packing the back of the truck, heaving boxes too big for his slight frame. Eli smiled a little; his beard had reached massive proportions, making him look like a drunk hobo Jesus. Her smiled fell. _'So much for the Winchester gospel_,' she thought cynically.

On the other side of the compound, Jo was teaching new recruits how to make a sawed-off shotgun, trying to finish her lesson before the last light faded. Her blonde hair was just as long and as shiny as it had always been, her face clean, even touched lightly with makeup, like she was trying desperately to hold on to some semblance of a normal life.

Castiel hobbled out from a side door, and Eli's eyes immediately fixed on him. He lingered, face tilted up, breathing in the evening air. The furrow was deep in his brow; even from her height Eli could see how breathtakingly blue his eyes were. He was more beautiful than any sunset could ever hope to be.

Jo caught his eye and smiled brightly, a bit too brightly, and waved, something delicate and shy in her gaze. Eli felt a stab of jealousy deep in her gut. Cas, for his benefit, looked vaguely confused at first, then relaxed and simply waved back. Eli almost wanted to laugh: despite having been human for over a year now, he was still so unassumingly oblivious sometimes it was adorable. God, she loved him.

The snippet of a song from Before flitted through her mind, some rock/pop anthem about the metaphorical end of the world, the tune nagging at her consciousness.

_"Let's see how far we've come,"_ she sang softly, unable to remember the rest of the words. Around her, the sky was growing dark, a few stars shining dimly through the smoggy haze. _"Let's see how far we've come._"

She laughed a little at her off-pitch voice, cracked and hoarse with exhaustion. She laughed, and then she cried, tiny painful tears leaching out of her despite her best efforts, near-silent sobs that racked her lungs until she couldn't breathe.

She cried, and cried, and cried, and didn't stop for a long time.

* * *

Castiel was in their cabin, drying his hair with an old towel. He was shivering slightly; the propane tanks had given out, and the commune's scarce mechanics were yet to find usable replacement parts during their raids. Eli hesitated in the doorway, watching his shirtless figure, noticing how trickles of cold water were making their way down his back, how his pants hung lower than ever on his lean hips. His necklace with its battered gold ring was still around his neck; he never took it off, not for any reason. She felt a rush of affection so strong she nearly choked on it.

He turned, having sensed someone else in the room, and his shoulders relaxed when he saw it was her. "Where were you?" he asked, noticing her wind-red cheeks.

"Roof," she answered shortly, walking over to him and resting her hands on his chest, feeling the steady, reassuring beat of his heart. His skin was damp to the touch, but warm. "It was a beautiful sunset."

"Hm," he said, and kissed the top of her head. "I don't know when was the last time I watched a sunset."

"Dean's on a mission?" she asked, and he drew away a little, his face troubled.

"Of course." He looked down at his bandaged foot. "I'm useless, now."

"Well, that's a lie," she said, kissing him. She started at his chest, right above his heart, and worked her way up his neck until her lips were tracing the delicate shell of his ear. "I can think of many uses for you."

"Oh, really?" he murmured throatily, a smile curled up in his tone. She pushed him down, so that he was sitting on the edge of the bed, and straddled him, pulling her shirt off and dipping her face down to press her lips to his. He responded enthusiastically, fingers moving down the line of her back to unsnap her bra. He slid it off, cupping her breasts with his hands and dipping his head, his mouth hot and wet against her skin. She buried her nose in his hair, breathing in the scent of their shampoo and his own lovely sunshine smell.

He flipped her over, lying on top and kissing her deeply, tracing her skin with fingers so gentle it gave her goosebumps. She let out a small whimper of pleasure as he found a tender place on her neck and bit it lightly.

"I love you," he breathed into her ear. She sniffled and he pulled back, staring at her with worry. "Why are you crying?"

She traced his face with her hand, loving the feel of his stubble, and smoothed the furrow from his brow with her thumb. "I just love you so much," she said. He tilted his head.

"And that makes you cry?"

She laughed a little. "Sometimes." He opened his mouth to speak again but she put a finger against it. "Don't speak," she insisted. "We'll talk tomorrow. Just…love me, Cas."

He nodded solemnly, blue eyes piercing, and sucked on her finger, making her giggle. Then he moved his mouth back to hers and made sure that she was loved very, very thoroughly.

When he woke the next morning her necklace and gold ring were curled on the pillow, and she was gone.

* * *

Eli easily picked the lock and slipped out of one of the side gates, shutting it softly behind her with the grim relief that at least the Croats weren't smart enough to open doors. They had started out fairly intelligent, but that had faded over time, until they were just mindless wild animals, wolves that scented your blood and came running from miles around.

It had been so hard to leave that room; the sight of him – sound asleep, his head thrown to the side, mouth slightly open, his breath an even rasp, so youthful and innocent in unconsciousness – had nearly undone her. She came very, very close to taking her clothes off and crawling back into bed, but instead just bent to tie her combat boots. Her ring she left coiled in its chain on the pillow, like a little snake. She wouldn't let Lucifer get his hands on that precious thing, that one symbol of beauty and love left in the world. She didn't know what Cas would do with it when he found out that she left; maybe he would destroy it, throw it away, shove it in a drawer and forget that it was there. But she was leaving it with him, to do with it as he pleased.

"Goodbye, love," she had whispered at the doorway. "My angel. My one good thing left in this whole world. Goodbye."

Lucifer had been right. Love was the easiest emotion to manipulate. Eli had lost a lot of things, had watched the world burn and killed friends, but she would not watch them be stretched and disemboweled on the rack for all of eternity. They could hate her forever for the betrayal, but their souls would be safe and protected. His soul would be safe and protected. Happy even. He might even believe that he was with her.

Eli shook her head and tried to concentrate on the task at hand. She stole into the night, creeping toward the dusky city ruins in the distance, their fires shading the skyline a dirty red. She walked, and waited for the inevitable attack.

She sensed the Croats before she saw them. "Hey!" she yelled. "Douchebags! Get the fuck out here! I'm waiting, you God-damn cannibal freaks!"

They inched from the darkness, uncommonly wary, their bloodshot eyes surveying her with hunger. They barely looked human anymore, shredded clothing scarcely covering pasty, festering bodies, blood and muck crusted in their fingernails and around their mouths. Some of them were children.

Eli clapped her hands and the advancing Croats stopped, growling and panting like dogs who wanted very badly to dive after a juicy bone. "All right, kids, stop right there," she said in a loud, only slightly shaky voice. "I know I'm tasty and delicious, but no meal for you tonight." Her tone hardened. "You may be mindless animals now, but you know who I am. That's why you didn't just attack. So do what you've been trained to do, boys. Take me to your master."

* * *

The devil was in an abandoned hotel not ten miles away. Eli didn't think that this was a coincidence. He knew she was coming.

The hotel was only partially burnt, which meant that much of it was intact, the only indication of fire the scorched stains and the blackened walls. The interior smelled like mold and rats and rotted wood.

He was sitting in the main lobby, which, due to the fact that the forth wall was blasted to pieces, resembled a stage, a mock-up of real life. That and the fact that he was on a velvet couch, this time in an immaculate white suit, his feet propped up on a small glass table.

Eli had collected her own little following, and by the time she stepped over the rubble that was once a wall she was surrounded by nearly a hundred Croats, their breath foul and reeking, like dark, feral protectors. Lucifer smiled widely at her, genuinely pleased, and lifted his feet off of the table.

"Elijah," he said in a tone that on anyone else would seem warm. "Finally. I was waiting." He paused, glancing around at the seething mass of Croats at her back. "And I trust my pets have taken good care of you?"

"Oh, they're just darling," she deadpanned, trying her hardest to channel Dean. "Sometimes wee on the carpet, but whack them on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper and they're fine."

He actually laughed at that, and it was an eerie sound coming from that waxy, familiar face. "Your bravery is…admirable," he said, standing and walking toward her. "I rather think I'm going to enjoy having you around for all of eternity."

She flinched at the world _eternity_, and he reached out and caught her chin in his hand. "Don't worry," he said calmly. "I'll be gentle."

"Just do it," she ground out, clenching her shaking hands into fists, tears leaking out of her eyes against her will.

"Such a rush to die," he said blandly, hand still on her chin. She met his gaze.

"They will go to Heaven," she said, her voice almost pleading. His strange, colorless eyes bored into hers with unwavering intensity.

"They will go to Heaven," he confirmed.

Eli nodded. She drew a deep breath, trying to memorize how it felt, being human. Her feet, sore and aching, the faint burnt rubber and mold smell in the air, the chill that raised the fine hair on her arms, the bruises and scars aching over her whole body, the wetness of her eyes, the dryness of her mouth. The beautiful, lovely feeling of freedom, of mortality. She closed her eyes.

"Do it."

The devil leaned down and kissed her, lightly, on the lips, and then the world dissolved into light and pain and fire and he burnt her down until her bones were ashes on the floor.

* * *

Castiel drifted out of sleep, his arm instinctively reaching for her. Her side of the bed was cold. He frowned, still half-unconscious, and moved his hand around as if to find her, his fingers instead brushing something small and smooth and round.

He jerked awake and sat up straight in the bed. Her necklace was lying there, coiled and silver, its gold ring glinting weakly in the dim morning light. His throat closed, a terrifying, claustrophobic feeling. She never took her necklace off. Not for anything.

"No," he breathed, staring at the cold metal in his hand. "Oh God, no."

He was out of bed in an instant, struggling with his pants, throwing on his boots without socks, their laces trailing pitifully behind him. His injured foot was throbbing but he left his crutches behind, limping as fast as he could out of the cabin and into the morning air. The sun was a pink smudge on the horizon, the day already warming up to be hot and humid. He found Chuck heading to the kitchen for breakfast and grabbed him, shaking the smaller man with ferocious desperation.

"Where's Dean?" he near-yelled. Chuck blinked, blindsided by the unexpected attack, still a little high from the night before.

"Cas?" he asked cautiously. "What happened?"

"Dean," Castiel snapped, his voice hoarse and shaking. "Where is Dean?"

"Uh, Risa's cabin, I think," Chuck stuttered. "But I don't think you should…"

Castiel dropped the prophet and ran across the yard, not even favoring his wounded foot. He could feel the stitches breaking, the blood pooling in his boot, but he ignored it and just moved faster. When he reached the dilapidated cabin he burst in without knocking, startling Dean into wakefulness.

"What the hell?" Dean muttered, instinctively training a gun on the intruder. Risa stirred sleepily at his side, her naked body only partially covered by the sheets. When Dean saw who it was he lowered his gun, checked to make sure he wasn't showing anything embarrassing, and hissed: "Dude, not cool. You can't just…"

"Eli is gone," Castiel interrupted, his voice frantic. Dean went very still.

"What?" he asked slowly. "Gone where? Are you sure?"

Castiel shook his head. "No, I mean… I haven't checked the compound yet, but she…she left this." He held up his hand and let the necklace dangle from it. Dean's face went a shade whiter as he stared at the golden ring spinning in the air.

"Okay. Okay," he said, trying to stay calm. "First things first. Let me put some pants on. You inspect every nook and cranny of this place, do you understand me? If she got out, I want to know how. I want to know if anyone saw her, if there are tracks, anything to lead us to her location. Maybe it's not too late. If we just…"

Outside, shouts began to rise up. The earth shook, throwing Castiel to the ground. Dean nearly tipped out of the bed. White light poured into the sky like water, growing brighter ever second. Castiel scrambled to his feet, the pounding in his foot worse than ever, and stumbled outside.

In the distance rose a mushroom cloud of light, the hot wind reaching them; it smelled like the clean static scent of lightning. The aftershock shook the commune, gashing the ground. A loud, cracking boom split the air, leaving their ears ringing, and then all went silent.

"We're too late," Dean's rough voice sounded from behind Castiel. He had managed to pull on pants and a shirt and stood watching the explosion with narrowed eyes. "Lucifer has her."

"No," Castiel croaked, watching as the white cloud of light blinked out of existence as quickly as it had appeared. "W…why? Why would she leave us? Leave me? Why…"

Dean clapped a hand on the fallen angel's shoulder. "I don't know, Cas. I don't think we ever will." His voice became grim, his mouth thinned into a tight, angry line. "But I do know one thing."

Castiel turned to him brokenly, his blue eyes tortured. "What?" he rasped, fearing the answer. Dean sighed, restlessly scanning the horizon, his voice flat and factual and cold.

"She's the enemy now."


	7. It's Time I Had Some Time Alone

AN: Hey guys! We're almost at the end of this strange, depressing little story. I would recommend that after you read this chapter you go to _Of The World _and re-read chapter seven (_Welcome to the End)_, because the next chapter deals with events that happen in that chapter without fully repeating them, so if you don't remember you might get confused. Thanks!

Thank you of course, from the bottom of my heart, for the wonderful reviews. And get ready for some hard-core depression.

* * *

**Chapter 7: It's Time I Had Some Time Alone**

_I think it turned ten o'clock but I don't really know  
And I can't remember caring for an hour or so  
Started crying and I couldn't stop myself  
I started running but there's nowhere to run to_

_

* * *

_

Castiel didn't really remember the next few days. Well, scratch that. He didn't really remember the next few weeks.

Really, considering the strict regimen of barbiturates, opiates, and alcohol he put himself on, he didn't really remember anything, ever. That was the point.

Dean found him, unshaven and dirty, facedown in bed, and roughly rolled him over. "Dude," he said, sounding more like the old Dean than he had in a long time. "Come on. This has to stop. Now I've got a mission tonight and I want you on it." He paused, surveying the former angel with disgust. "And when was the last time you took a shower? Or ate?"

Castiel blinked at him hazily. "I am…hungry," he said with uncertainty, as if he wasn't quite sure. Dean sighed and hauled him into a sitting position.

"You can't go on like this, man," Dean said, sitting down next to him. "Life sucks, I know, but you have to…"

"Life sucks?" Castiel asked, laughing harshly, tears leaking out of his eyes. "I used to be an angel, Dean. I am thousands of years old. And now look at me. I'm human. Useless. Alone. The world has gone to hell. The angels are gone. God is gone. The only thing that was holding me together is..." He paused, choking on the words. "Gone. We are alone in the universe. And there is no way we can stop Lucifer now. Why are we even trying anymore? Why are we still waking up in the morning? Why…"

Dean stood, leaned back, and punched Castiel across the face, hard, so that the former angel tasted blood.

"Now you listen to me, you whiny little girl," Dean hissed. "Nothing is over yet. Not yet. We're gonna find the Colt, and when we do, we're gonna blow the devil's brains out. That is a promise. But I need my soldiers alive and functioning. You wanna cry? Fine, but do it on your own time. This is my camp, and my army, and you are going to take a goddamn shower and report for duty! Do you understand me?"

"Dean…" Castiel started groggily. Dean punched him again, splitting his lip.

"_Do you understand me?_"

Castiel rubbed his cheek sullenly. "Yes."

"Good. Now I'm gonna send someone up here with food in fifteen minutes, and you damn well better be showered and ready. And for God's sake, trim your fingernails. You look like fucking Nosferatu." He clapped a still-woozy Castiel on the shoulder. "Best antidote for pain is revenge," he said seriously. "You help me find the Colt, we pull the trigger on the devil, it'll be the best feeling in the world, man. You'll see."

Castiel said nothing, but when Dean left he climbed into the freezing shower, cut his nails and the long curling ends of his hair with dull scissors, and attempted to shave, leaving the face in the mirror mostly-bare and severely nicked, but clean. His stomach rumbled painfully with hunger as the last of his high faded away, his limbs shaking ever-so-slightly from weakness and exhaustion.

"Kill the devil," he told his reflection in a rough, cracked voice. "It's ok. We're going to kill the devil." His hand came up to briefly touch the two rings around his neck. "I promise you, we'll kill the devil."

* * *

The months rolled on. For a while, this motivation was all that kept Castiel going. His life fell into a cycle of work, missions, drugs, the occasional meal, some sleep. Most of the time, when he wasn't working, he found himself sitting in a heap by the foot of the bed, a bottle in hand, staring blankly into space and thinking of better times.

He remembered that night, the night when she said that this all felt wrong, like reality was warped and none of this was supposed to happen. The night he proposed to her. At the time he had thought it was wishful thinking, but now he wondered if it wasn't something else. She was a Nephilim after all, something wholly unique and different in the universe, and even with her power bound she might have been able to perceive things the rest of them couldn't.

Maybe he was the one with wishful thinking.

Castiel closed his eyes and leaned his head against the side of the bed. He wondered what it would have been like to have children. As an angel he had been sterile, but as a human…who knows. His mind conjured up images of a small dark-haired boy and little freckled girl running in a park, jumping up and down in a kitchen, voices high and squeaky and shoes so very, very tiny. Eli would have been a great mom, he thought hazily, taking a long drink, the liquid burning down his throat. It would have been nice, to have real human experiences, to watch her stomach swell with pregnancy, to tuck small faces into bed at night. Being human would have been worth it, for that.

But no. More likely, if the apocalypse hadn't happened, if Lucifer had been stopped and mankind hadn't been ravaged by the Croatoan virus, life would have been difficult. He would have continued to be a fugitive from Heaven, Eli would have continued to live her strange half-life, not quite human, not an angel. He didn't even know if she would have continued to age. Maybe they would have had to see each other only in secret, quiet moments forever, always running, always fighting some new evil. But at least they would have been together.

Then, like curtains parting, he had a brief, fleeting image of them in Heaven together, both angels, in a house with windows that overlooked four different seasons. She was cooking breakfast in only his shirt, her hair tumbling unbound past her shoulders, as he wrapped his arms around her from behind and kissed her neck…

"Cas? Is…is this a bad time?"

A tentative voice jolted him out of his reverie, and the vision faded. He reached up and wiped wetness from his eyes, turning to the thin figure lingering in the doorway.

"Jo," he said in a dull, raspy voice. "No, it's, uh…it's fine. What do you want?"

Jo shrugged and tucked a long strand of blonde hair behind her ear. "Nothing. I just…your light was on, and I…couldn't sleep. Chuck said…you might have something to calm me down?"

"Stash is in the drawer," he said, indicating the desk with his liquor bottle. "Grab me a couple of whatever you're having."

"Will do." She crossed the room and rummaged through the drawer, coming up with a small marked bottle of pills. She scrutinized the peeling label, then tipped some into her hand before coming over sitting cross-legged next to Castiel, taking his liquor and using it to down about half of them. He took the rest, throwing them back with a long swig of whisky, and sighed, waiting for everything to turn hazy.

Jo leaned against the bed, her eyes to the ceiling. "Thanks," she said softly, her voice already a little thick. "A lotta nights, when I close my eyes, all I see is the hellhound, ripping my mom apart, again and again and again." She paused to take another drink from his bottle. "There's just… so much blood, you know? Way too much blood. I'm covered in it."

"I'm sorry," he said in a quiet voice. She waved it off.

"Don't be. Happened a long time ago. World's fucked anyway, right? But here we are."

"Here we are," he repeated dully.

She looked at him out of the corner of her eye. "You loved her a lot, didn't you?"

His throat closed up. "Very much."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be."

They were silent for a long time, just drinking and staring into space, passing the bottle back and forth. Castiel's head felt pleasantly fuzzy and warm, like the sharp edges of the world were dulled and softened, almost glowing.

"D'ya ever think about what could have happened?" Jo finally asked, and it was like he could see the words coming out of her mouth, wisps of smoke and letters. Whatever she had given him was potent. "Like, if my mom hadn't died, or if Dean had said yes, or Sam had said no. If life had just… kept on going, way it was supposed to."

"Every day," he said. It was getting a little difficult to form coherent words.

"I would have gone to school, I think," she said dreamily, tracing the air with her hands. "Who says you can't be a hunter and have a degree? Green campus lawns, trees flowering in the spring, parties with lots of beer, dorm rooms, bunk beds, and mmm, college boys." Her words were like a stream of consciousness, no filter left between her brain and her mouth. "Would'a been…nice. Don'tcha think it would'a been nice?"

"Very," he said quietly.

She laughed a little. "We're a mess, aren't we?" she asked, giggling and squeezing her eyes shut. Suddenly he wanted to giggle too, because it all seemed so very funny, the end of the world, this horrible grey reality they found themselves in, like one big cosmic joke. The former angel of the Lord, stoned on the floor. He laughed.

"A mess," he snorted, covering his face with shaking hands. "We are such a mess. We're messy."

And then she leaned in, her soft hands prying his from his face, and kissed him.

He jerked back. "What are you doing?" he asked groggily, wishing that he could think straight. The world swayed. "What…what are you doing?"

"Please, Cas," she said, nearly draping herself in his startled lap, her hands on his shoulders. "I need this. So do you! Just for tonight, let's just… forget. Forget everything."

"You…" he said, trying to form coherent words, trying to say, _no, this is wrong, I won't sleep with someone else, I won't betray her like that, I can't_, but all that came out was a slightly breathy: "Your hair is…yellow. Like hers. Very yellow. Sun hair."

"It's okay," Jo soothed, cupping his face with her hand, her pupils large, her words stilted and thick. "It's okay. You can pretend I'm her; I don't mind."

"Jo, I…" he started to say, not sure if he was going to follow that up with _I'm not going to do this_, or _I'm really high right now_, or _I have no idea what is going on,_ or _could you please make the room stop dancing_, because she kissed him again. He found that he missed the feel of lips on his own, all warm and sweet. How many months had it been now? He couldn't remember.

She pulled away a little bit, her hair falling around their faces like a curtain. "Not Jo," she insisted. "Not tonight. Just…kiss me, okay? Kiss me, Cas."

Castiel reached up and traced the curve of her face with a trembling hand. In the dark room it was easy to imagine that the shadowed face in front of him was someone else. Hell, he was so high, he almost believed it.

He kissed her, hard, pulling her lips to his with an angry ferocity. She raked her hands through his hair and kissed him back, letting him push her to the floor. He covered her body with his, reveling in the feel of someone small and soft under him, the smell of skin and shampoo, long legs wrapped around his waist, his name moaned as a breathy whimper. At some point, when the world dimmed to one almost painful moment of oblivion, he cried a name too, but it wasn't Jo's.

It was okay. She didn't mind.

* * *

Unfortunately, when Castiel woke up the next morning, he did mind.

He took one look at the figure asleep in the bed next to him and bolted from the room, only just managing to pull pants and a shirt on and stuff his feet (the right one now healed, finally) into boots.

He found Dean in the war room, smoking a cigarette and pouring over maps. He looked gaunt, his face lined, the smoke wreathing his head like a stained halo.

Dean looked up as Castiel entered. "Check out these photos we just got back from our last recon mission. They're kinda grainy, but I…" He paused, raising an eyebrow. "What's up with you?"

Castiel crossed the room, leaning in and speaking to Dean in a low, frantic voice. "I slept with Jo last night."

Dean brightened a little. "Really? Man, that's great! I always knew she had a thing for you."

Castiel shook his head as if he couldn't hear properly. "You…you're _happy _about this?"

"Aren't you?"

He ran his hands through his hair, stuttering, searching for words. "No, I mean…I don't know. Should I be? It's…it's…_wrong_. Isn't it?"

Dean got up and put a hand on Castiel's shoulder. "Dude, look at me." Castiel turned his head, meeting his friend's serious, exhausted eyes. "She's gone, and nothing is going to bring her back. The world is _ending_. So live a little! Enjoy this! Believe me, after all the shit you've been through, you deserve it."

"I don't know if I can," Castiel rasped, rubbing at his unshaven cheek. "I just…don't know."

"Well, clearly you _knew_ last night," Dean said, elbowing him in the ribs. "How was it?"

"I…" Castiel paused, thinking hard. "Good? I think. We were rather…incapacitated. Narcotics and alcohol. She…was rather forceful."

Dean guffawed, then started to laugh until he was holding his sides tightly. "You telling me she _took advantage of you_?" He started laughing again.

"It's not funny!" Castiel bristled.

Dean shook his head, tears of laughter springing to his eyes. "No, no, of course it's not." He clapped the former angel on the shoulder again, shaking his head. "Come on, Cas, don't get your panties in a twist. Just…go back there and have some fun, all right? That's an order." He turned and walked back to the table, still chuckling. "Man, I almost forgot what it was to laugh."

Castiel knew that was his cue to leave. He walked back to his cabin, dragging his feet and trying to dispel the heavy, empty feeling in his chest. He hesitated at the door, then pushed it open with shaking hands.

Jo was sitting up in the bed, her hair a mess of tangles, wearing one of his shirts. She looked at him almost shyly as he entered. "Hi."

"Good morning," he said, trudging to the bed and sitting down next to her, his hands clasped in front of him. "Did you… sleep well?"

"Oh, yeah. Yes. I guess." She tucked a strand of messy hair behind her ear and bit her lip. "Did…ah, did you?"

"Mm," he said noncommittally. Jo touched his hand with tentative fingers.

"Look, Cas, I'm sorry if I…I've just been really lonely, you know? And I thought…but if you regret it, then, I'm sorry, and…"

"I do not regret it."

Jo paused mid-ramble. "You…don't?"

He stared at her hand touching his with an unreadable expression on his face, then slowly lifted his blue eyes to look at her. Her eyes were hazel, he noted dimly, not green, her teeth a little crooked, mouth small. She still looked so very young. "I do not…regret it," he repeated. "I am…unsure as to how I feel about it, but I do not regret it."

Jo nodded, blushing. "Oh. Okay."

"Perhaps…" He hesitated, still feeling incredibly that this was wrong, but he had a flash memory of waking up in the morning to find the ring resting on the cold pillowcase next to him, and all of the revelations that came with that discovery, the months of unending sadness. "Perhaps I would be able to discern how I felt about it if I were to have the experience while more…aware."

"Really?" Jo asked hopefully, squeezing his hand. He looked at her, something shadowed and pained in his eyes.

"It's the end of the world. There isn't much left to lose."

She kissed him, and he let her, and he lost something.

* * *

After a while, Jo became withdrawn, spiraling into her own personal depression, and so he turned to other women. At first they were all blonde; he liked that. In the dark it made it easier to forget, to pretend. Then it didn't matter so much anymore, as long as they were willing. And they were always willing.

He knew things were getting a little out-of-control when the faces started to become nameless, when he would wake from a drug-induced haze to find several naked bodies around him. But it was okay. He had found just the right combination of amphetamines to keep him alert and oddly peppy during the day, when he went on raids and missions and strategy meetings with their fearless leader, and just the right combination of alcohol, narcotics, and sex to make him relaxed and unmindful at night.

Months rolled on. Castiel felt like he was slipping further and further away from himself every day, like the love and happiness he had once had were nothing but a dream and a pair of rings that dangled small and cold from his neck.

And then one day Dean walked into his cabin, the wrong Dean, his face all youthful and confused and innocent, and Castiel's sad little world was upended.


	8. The Other Night I Dreamt Of Knives

**AN**: Just wanted to say thank you to everyone for coming along with me on this strange, dark journey, especially those of you who reviewed. Did you all go back and reread chapter 7 of _Of The World_? No? Well then go back and read it now, I'll wait. It's important to this chapter in many ways.

And...thank you!

* * *

**Chapter 8: The Other Night I Dreamt Of Knives**

_It was cool cool, it was just all cool  
Now it's over for me and it's over for you_

_

* * *

_

The moment he touched down in their world, Eli sensed it.

It was like a breath of fresh air had blown through the stench of death and fire to rest lightly on her shoulder, and she knew, knew down to her very bones that this was what she had been waiting for all along. This is what she had glimpsed when her perception was still clouded. This was the end.

She smiled grimly, hand touching the always-cold collar around her neck. Maybe eternity wouldn't be as long as they thought.

"What are you smiling about, pet?"

Eli continued to stare out the window, one hand idly playing with her ridiculous, too-white hair. "Dean is coming," she said softly. Lucifer made a small noise in the back of his throat.

"Of course he is. Today is the day that I am going to kill him." He paused, and she could feel his eyes on the back of her head. "Or were you still holding out hope that that silly gun could actually kill me?"

She shook her head slightly. "No. I can see everything. Dean will die."

"Hm," he said, put-off by her strange, flat answers, but by that point he was used to it. It turned out that having an immensely powerful pet was not as gratifying as he thought it would be. Most of the time she just sat there peacefully, like listening to music no one else could hear. She didn't even protest that much when he had her wipe out cities or flatten towns. She just did it. Calmly, a little sadly, just waved her hand with a bored gesture and left him to gloat by himself. He wanted emotion, rebellion. He wanted something to break. He wanted to _win._

"I'll see you tonight," he purred, touching her hair lightly, and was amused when she flinched, even if was for a fraction of a second. "To celebrate."

He disappeared with the softest flurry of wings.

Eli continued to stare out the window.

The truth was, even collared, her powers were vaster than he could have imagined, like she was connected to every atom running through the universe. The truth was, when he wasn't looking, when she appeared to be bored and servile, she was actually far away, watching the lives of those she loved but unable to interfere, waiting for the end.

She saw Castiel spiral into darkness, saw Dean lose the little pieces of his soul that he still had left. She was there the day that Jo hung herself in her closet. And she saw Chuck…

Well, she saw Chuck. And she knew, and she hated him for it.

But everything was different now. Everything could change. For the first time in a very long time, there was hope.

Eli waited.

* * *

When Dean first walked into his cabin, Castiel thought that all of the drugs had finally broken his mind. But his mostly-dead angel powers flared weakly to life to tell him that no, it was true: Dean had traveled through time. There was still hope.

Of course, Dean being the stubborn ass he was, there wasn't much of it.

"There is a different way things could have gone," Castiel insisted that night. They were in the car, speeding in the pre-dawn darkness toward Lucifer and what looked to be the final battle. "You can set things right, Dean. I know you can."

"Says the dude who just downed amphetamines to counteract absinthe," Dean muttered darkly.

Castiel shook his head, keeping his eyes on the road. "I'm still the same, underneath. Still your friend. And I am telling you, no, _begging _you, please, please say yes to Michael."

"Why are you saying this?" Dean demanded. "If I say yes, half the planet will get roasted. There has to be another way."

"_Look around you, Dean._ This is not fake. It is not a dream, or an illusion. This is your future. And while you're here for three days, we've been living it for _five years._" Castiel's voice was harsher and lower than it had been for a long time, his hands gripping the wheel until his knuckles turned white. "Do you want to know what your future is? We live without food, clean water, amenities. We watched California sink into the ocean, governments collapse. We've had to shoot our friends. We've lost everything we've ever loved, and we go to bed each night praying, _praying _that we don't wake up in the morning."

"Why do you have two rings around your neck?" Dean asked in a careful voice. Castiel swung on him, taking his eyes off of the road to glare at the younger hunter.

"_Because I was married, _and because the woman I loved is dead."

"I thought she was…"

"She's _dead._"

Dean fell silent, watching the burned houses and busted trees rush by them, the world the dim blue of when the sun is just beyond the horizon. "Why do they keep calling her a dog?"

Castiel squeezed his eyes shut for just a moment, his voice jagged and rough. "Because that's what you call something that wears a collar."

The sun rose in the distance, setting the smoggy sky on fire. The world exploded in reds and oranges and yellow, beautiful and sick. Castiel popped another pill, and waited for the end.

* * *

Lucifer finally got what he wanted from her. A rebellion. Something to break.

She was stronger than he thought. It was oddly touching, the way she ground her heels into the dirt and bore the pain, fists clenched, how she refused even as the collar peeled the skin away from her body in flaming chunks, punishing her for her disobedience. How she really seemed to believe that she could hold out indefinitely, powered by love alone. Yes, touching was a good word. And stupid. Stupid was a good word as well.

And the look on Castiel's face…well, that was just the icing on the cake. His anguish was almost too sweet, the sheer impotence of his situation, her fire reflected in those blue eyes. It felt like _winning._

And then, oh, and then, the mortal angel pulled a hidden gun from the side of his leg and shot himself in the head, a clean, crisp shot that sent blood spraying outward like red paint across the grass. _That _was beautiful.

Her punishment ceased immediately. Eli looked down with relief at her skin, whole and unblemished, for one dazed moment of innocence before catching sight of his body splayed on the ground.

"Oh no," she whimpered, dropping to her knees as if all the muscles in her body had given out. She dragged herself to him, mud and blood seeping stickily into her white dress. "Oh, God, no…" She was even _crying_. He hadn't seen her cry in such a long time.

The living Dean, the one from the past, was watching the scene with such horror on his face it looked like he was about to be sick. Lucifer smiled widely.

"You see, Dean, I win," he said, his voice glutted with glee and triumph. Inside of his head, Sam started shouting, the first noise he had made in months, scratching his claws at the inside of their shared skull. Lucifer brutally shut him up. "No matter how the game is played, no matter what you change, in the end, I always get what I want. So, I win."

Everything was beautiful, so absolutely beautiful. His world. Soon to be cleansed and perfect. He would be God to a new race, and she would be broken, and his. Always his.

"Kill me," Eli's voice rang out. Lucifer jerked to look at her. She had pulled Castiel's head in her lap, stroking his hair with loving, tender fingers, her dress and hands drenched in blood. And she was staring at Dean. "Only an Archangel can. Dean, you can stop all of this. I have to die. It's the only way."

She was telling him secrets. That was not allowed. She was supposed to be _broken._ "Stop," Lucifer ordered.

"Kill me, Dean," she said in a firm, clear voice. Lucifer stepped forward, raising his hand, waiting for the moment the collar would sear her flesh.

There was a flash of light, and Dean was gone, leaving the two of them alone in the field. Eli bent her head over Castiel's body, raining soft, salty kisses on his face, and for a moment, just a brief, brief moment, Lucifer found himself strangely disconcerted by such love in the face of death.

It passed quickly. He rolled his shoulders, savoring the taste of victory in the air. "Well, I guess our Dean didn't succeed," he said cheerily. "We're still here."

Eli's shoulders were shaking, her face still lowered and covered by a curtain of hair. Then he realized what was happening and took a stumbling step back.

She wasn't crying. She was _laughing._

"Not for long," Eli said, lifting her face to the sky. He shook his head frantically.

"No! This is my world! My world! My…"

Everything went white, and the future ceased to be.

* * *

The clock ticked back relentlessly, and for a brief moment Eli had the sense of falling through everything that had happened, through darkness punctuated by flashes of what could have been.

_**"Because I was married, and because the woman I loved is dead."**_

_**"D'ya ever think about what could have happened? Like, if my mom hadn't died, or if Dean had said yes, or Sam had said no. If life had just… kept on going, way it was supposed to."**_

_**"I promise you, we'll kill the devil."**_

_** "Goodbye, love. My angel. My one good thing left in this whole world. Goodbye."**_

_** "I just love you so much."  
"And that makes you cry?"**_

_** "I know many a demon that would just love to sink their claws into good ol' Castiel."**_

_** "You've been draining your power helping me to heal. And you've been worrying about me, haven't you?"**_

_** "If it makes you feel any better, I plan to use that one bullet of mine as soon as I'm done."  
"I had the same idea."**_

"_**Marry me, Eli."**_

"_**I feel like we took a wrong step somewhere. Like none of this was supposed to happen. Like when I close my eyes I can almost see another reality, another way things could have gone. The right way."**_

"_**Stupidest plan in the world. What is this, the Clark Kent school of disguise?"**_

"_**Until we figure things out, expect that anyone can betray us. Hell, if I were in their position, it's what I'd do."**_

"_**Nobody is handing anybody over to Lucifer!"**_

"_**The angels leaving did this?"  
"It's gone. Most of it. The moment they left it was like watching water slip through my fingers."**_

"_**Fight him, Sam. Don't let this all be a mistake."**_  
"_**I promise. I won't give up."**_

"_**Just wait. It's going to get much, much worse."**_

"_**I don't know if he's gonna come around, Sam."**  
**"He will. We're brothers."  
"I hope to God you're right."**_

And then…

* * *

Water was falling softly on her head. Eli blinked and looked around the tiny motel shower, her hands still partially soapy. She took a deep breath, inhaling steam and the scent of shampoo, and tried to clear her thoughts. What had just happened? It was like some hugely important thing had occurred, but it was slipping to the edge of her consciousness, and the harder she tried to grasp it the further it moved away, until it was just a fuzzy dark cloud of _something_.

She shook her head and continued rinsing her hair. Oh well. Probably nothing.

The bathroom door clicked open and Castiel stuck his head in. "Zachariah has Dean," he informed her gravely. "I am going to bring him here."

She pulled aside the shower curtain so that her wet face was visible. "Okay. Just…wait until the last minute, if you can. You never know when Zach's gonna let slip something important."

Castiel nodded, his eyes on the partially-opaque curtain. She grinned and motioned for him to come closer; when he was within arm's reach she grabbed his shirt with one wet hand and pulled him in for a kiss.

"Maybe when Dean's gone we can take another shower?" she murmured, grinning like an idiot. He kissed her again, tugging gently at her lower lip with his teeth.

"I'll get rid of him quickly."

When he was gone Eli returned to her shower, cranking up the water until it was near-scalding and rinsing the last of the shampoo out of her hair. For some reason the hot water seemed particularly glorious, like she hadn't felt it in a long time. Eyes closed, warm and comfortable, her lover off saving Dean from the clutches of a particularly nasty angel, Eli found herself singing, ever so softly, under her breath.

_"Let's see how far we've come, let's see how far we've come._"

It was like that song was important, once, but it didn't matter anymore.

Eli stepped out of the shower, and into reality.

**The End**


End file.
